Year: 2007

After announcing it in November 2006, Emulex finally release its HBA management solutions for Microsoft Virtual Server 2005: VMPilot.

This first release, which supports LightPulse 4GB/s HBAs, allows users to:

• create SAN-attached virtual machines
• migrate VMs without reconfiguring storage or copying files
• centrally manage multiple Virtual Servers virtual machines operations in SAN environment
• apply zoning per virtual machine

Emulex also revealed future versions of VMPilot will support upcoming System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM).

Download it here.

Red Hat approach to Xen has been very confused so far.

Now, after release of first enterprise distribution, RHEL 5, featuring the open source hypervisor for the first time, tech magazine are starting to publish their reviews.

First one is from SearchServerVirtualization which details the guest OS creation and installation process, highlighting som glitches:

…

At this point, the installation is just like a standard installation of the OS. There is, however, one tricky point in the process. After you go through all the standard screens asking for your time zone, etc., you are presented with a final standard installation screen asking you to begin the final install. At that point, the console window you’ve been working in disappears! You then need to go to the host OS shell and execute “xm create guestname”, which in our case the entire string was “xm create RHELguest1″…

NetworkWorld goes further, comparing Xen implementation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux against Novell SUSE Linux Enterprise one:

..we found, is that Red Hat’s Xen implementation is far more evolved than what we found in SUSE 10, although it does lack comprehensive instrumentation.

…

When we tested the RHEL5 native kernel for performance (using OS install time-chosen defaults, as we normally do) against SUSE 10, we found little notable differences in our LMBench results.

…

The impact of introducing Xen’s hypervisor to the subsequently Xen-ified RHEL5 kernel represented only nominal latency from the native RHEL5 results. We measured the Xen impact on performance, and found that the ‘insertion loss’ of the hypervisor layer and ‘Xenified RHEL5 kernel’ are nominal: performance isn’t affected much. Adding guest operating systems to the Xenified RHEL5 kernel dragged down performance…

InfoStor magazine published an extended and interesting review of Scalent Virtual Operating Environment (V/OE) 2.0, providing following conclusion:

Using Scalent V/OE, we had virtualized our SAN connections to create a wire-once fabric to simplify data-center system management. Through its Web-based GUI, Scalent Console provided us with a single-pane-of-glass interface for numerous system administration tasks. More importantly, the console provided a unified context for both the physical and logical topologies of our IT infrastructure, as well as a better understanding of the real-time relationships between the physical and virtual IT environments.

IT will increasingly apply virtualization to increase the utilization of new and existing resources and simplify systems/storage management. By extending virtualization to the way infrastructure resources—both physical and virtual—connect, Scalent V/OE ensures virtualization schemes work as expected, are easily managed, and provide all of their cost-savings potential.

Scalent is applying datacenter automation capabilities, first appeared in virtualized enviroments, to traditional. physical infrastructures. If you are not confident with this approach this review worths a reading.

Steven Bink, which is attending Microsoft Management Summit (MMS) 2007 in San Diego right now, reports a new detail on upcoming Windows Server Virtualization hypervisor (codename Viridian):

Besides hot add Nics, Mem and CPU’s in VM’s that run on Windows Hypervisor (Viridian) it will support live compacting of VHD’s. Now you when you have to take the VM offline after defragging the VHD.

As expected Microsoft announced System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) beta 2, which will be publicly available within 45 days.

In this new beta Microsoft introduces most wanted features like:

• Virtualization Candidates Recognition
  System Center Virtual Machine Manager leverages historical performance data in the Operations Manager 2007 database to identify and list underutilized physical servers that are good candidates for consolidation
• Capacity Planning
  When a virtual machine is deployed, Virtual Machine Manager analyzes performance data and resource requirements for both the workload and the host. This allows an IT administrator to fine-tune placement algorithms to get the best matched deployment recommendations. First, historical performance data is used to understand actual resource requirements of the workload. Next, minimum CPU, disk, RAM, and network capacity requirements in the virtual machine’s configuration are checked. After determining the virtual machine’s requirements, performance data is gathered for candidate virtual machine hosts. Finally, pre-selected business rules are factored in to optimize placement recommendations either for resource maximization or for load balancing, and to weight the importance of different resource types for the workload.
• Physical to Virtual (P2V) Migration
  Virtual Machine Manager improves the Physical-to-Virtual (P2V) experience by integrating the conversion process and by using the Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) of Windows Server 2003 to create the virtual machine faster and without having to interrupt the source physical server
• Dynamic Workloads Placement
  Resource settings can be changed on virtual machines without interrupting workloads and virtual machines can be migrated from one host to another to optimize physical resources
• Complete Scriptable Environment
  Virtual Machine Manager is built on Windows PowerShell, a new administrator-focused command shell and scripting language. Easy to adopt, learn and use, Windows PowerShell’s architecture enables the quick construction of ad-hoc integration solutions. Windows PowerShell scripting features allow administrators to integrate System Center with established tools and procedures in the data center.

Check the complete feature list here.

Subscribe the beta announcement here.

Given timeframe for SCVMM beta 2 means it will be released at WinHEC 2007 conference, where customers also hope to see first public beta of Windows Server Virtualization (codename Viridian).

With this product Microsoft is going to fill the big void left in virtualization management space of these last three years, competing at the same time against three VMware products: VirtualCenter, Lab Manager and Capacity Planner.

Update: Conference attendees are reporting interesting feedbacks about what Microsoft is showing of Virtual Machine Manager.

Omar is reporting SCVMM is able to perform a Virtual to Virtual (V2V) migration of VMware virtual machines on a Longhorn host (where Windows Server Virtualization will serve them).

Quoting from CA official announcement:

CA today announced the results of an independent global study that highlights the mixed results companies are experiencing with server virtualization—as well as critical success factors discovered by early adopters.

According to the study—which surveyed 800 organizations around the world—44 percent of respondents who said they had deployed server virtualization technology were unable to declare their deployment a success. Inability to quantify ROI was a key factor in their reticence to definitively claim positive results.

…

For organizations claiming success with virtualization, the most important factor was being able to measure performance of the virtualized environment. Other key success factors cited in the study include diligent inventorying of server assets and load distribution, and thorough investigation of available technology solutions.

…

The survey was conducted in January by The Strategic Counsel, an independent research firm. Of the respondents, 30 percent were from North America, 37 percent were from Europe, and 31 percent from the Asia-Pacific and Japan region. Of the organizations surveyed, 67 percent had between 10 and 99 physical servers, and 22 percent had more than 200…

No suprise here: in part virtualization market is still immature (despite IDC claims for Virtualization 2.0), in part technology seems so easy to implement that customers usually believe they can approach a complex enterprise project after a successful experience with VMware Workstation (or corrispondent).

Underestimation of virtualization challenges, something even system integrators are guilty of, leads to not properly invest in staff training and/or in professional consulting much before the project is set to start.

Quoting from SearchServerVirtualization:

…VMware is advancing performance by working the hardware and software ecosystem. If you look at hardware assist for virtualization, for example, Intel and AMD have a long-term roadmap for baking in hardware assist into the chips. Before, the x86 processor architecture wasn’t very virtualization-friendly and VMware had to come up with roundabout ways to translate the processor instructions between the software and the hardware.

Then there’s memory virtualization [Ed. note: AMD’s Nested Page Tables and Intel’s Extended Page Tables]. We have high hopes for memory assist. Between CPU, memory and I/O virtualization, in three years’ time, we should be able to eliminate the performance overhead, so that virtual equals native…

Read the whole article at source.

After KVM won the race for Linux kernel inclusion over VMware and XenSource, virtualization competitors need now to rely on paravirt-ops interface.

To reach such integration, VMware has to make interopeable its own virtualization interface for Linux, Virtual Machine Interface (VMI), with paravirt-ops.

Part of the task has been already achieved with the experimental support of VMI-paravirtualized Linux guests in upcoming Workstation 6.0 / Player 2.0.

Now final part of the operation is near too, with integration of VMI adapter in upcoming Linux kernel 2.6.21 as reported by eWeek.

eWeek published a brief but interesting review of new Virtual Iron 3.5, evaluating management capabilities, hardware and software support.

Reviewer doesn’t provide a score or an organic final conclusion but a single sentence:

Virtual Iron 3.5 offers a flexible, low-cost fix with impressive provisioning capabilities.

Read the whole review at source.

Quoting from the NEC official announcement:

…

SigmaSystemCenter helps businesses to streamline system management, integrating seamlessly with Microsoft System Center Operations Manager to efficiently maintain system service levels. Providing a unified and scalable solution, SigmaSystemCenter is NEC Corporation’s platform management product currently distributed in Japan and available worldwide.

Working closely with Microsoft, NEC now supports Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 in addition to current support of Microsoft Operations Manager 2005. NEC plans to expand the integration through future enhanced products of Microsoft’s Dynamic Systems Initiative and support of Microsoft Windows Server Longhorn Virtualization technology…