virtualization.info Editors

Quoting from the IT Week:

ClearCube Technology will today unveil software to help IT staff manage user desktops as virtual machines.
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Sentral 5.0, available from June, is an overhaul of the existing ClearCube Management Suite (CMS), with the ability to manage virtualised desktop environments.
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The tools also work with other systems, such as IBM’s virtualised hosted client infrastructure.

Sentral supports VMware and Microsoft Virtual Server. Pricing will depend on the number of virtual machines to be managed…

Read the whole article at source.

Quoting from the Microsoft official announcement:

At WinHEC, which runs May 23-25 at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center here), Bob Muglia. Microsoft’s senior vice president of the Server and Tools Business, will provide updates on Microsoft’s new virtualization solutions. Of special note:

• Windows Server virtualization: Microsoft’s hypervisor-based solution is on track to be available with the upcoming Microsoft Windows Server “Longhorn” operating system. Microsoft anticipates having a beta release of Windows Server virtualization by the end of 2006 and plans to release to manufacturing (RTM) within 180 days of Windows Server “Longhorn” RTM.
• Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager: Formerly code-named “Carmine,” this technology is a centralized, enterprise management solution for the virtualized data center. System Center Virtual Machine Manager is part of the System Center family of products and is due for beta release within the next 90 days. Microsoft anticipates release to manufacturing (RTM) in the second half of 2007.
• Intent to acquire Softricity, Inc: Softricity’s application virtualization and streaming technologies provide application compatibility and accelerate corporate desktop transitions to Windows Vista.

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Microsoft’s efforts to accelerate the delivery of virtualization solutions also includes engaging with industry partners, such as AMD and Intel to bring customers hardware-assisted virtualization in Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1. Microsoft is also collaborating with Intel on the design and specification of Intel Virtualization for Directed I/O (Intel VT-d), as well as working closely with AMD to help pave the way for a new class of innovation, such as AMD’s I/O virtualization technology.

On the OEM front, system manufacturers Dell, HP and IBM all have voiced their support for Microsoft’s virtualization strategy. Microsoft is also working with other leading vendors to define a standard management application programming interface (API) through the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF).

To foster interoperability of virtualization technologies and encourage innovation around new virtual machine solutions, Microsoft continues to license the Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) file format for virtual machines compatible with both Virtual Server and Windows Server “Longhorn” hardware virtualization products royalty-free. More than 45 vendors have signed up for this licensing, including Akimbi, Brocade, Diskeeper, Fujitsu-Siemens, Network Appliance, Platespin, Softricity, Virtual Iron and XenSource…

The WinHEC conference has still to start but a part of new Microsoft strategy about virtualization has already been leaked:
Steven Bink discovered and reported the new Virtual Machine Manager product site.

Virtual Machine Manager, which was previously been named Virtual Server Manager and codename Carmine, will be available following this scheduling:

• Beta 1 – summer 2006
• Beta 2 – Q1 2007
• RTM – H2 2007

This early beta launch is very important cause it means Microsoft changed its mind, offering its virtualization management product not only for upcoming codename Viridian, but also for existing Virtual Server 2005 R2, which should be powered by the new Service Pack 1 on the summer as well.

Virtual Machine Manager will offer the most requested features from virtualization administrators:

• virtualization candidates recognition
• physical to virtual (P2V) migration
• virtual workloads placement and migration on hosts servers
• virtual infrastructure automation (including virtual machines library management and provisioning)

Read features description and relative FAQs.
Register for the beta at Microsoft Connect.

The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.

Quoting from the Egenera official announcement:

Egenera Inc. today announced that it has been selected as a winner of the annual “Red Herring 100 North America” award by Red Herring magazine. The list of 100 private companies in North America recognizes those that play a leading role in innovating the technology business. The entire list can be viewed at www.redherring.com.
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Vern Brownell, Egenera founder and CTO, will present the company’s strategy at the exclusive Red Herring Spring 2006 CEO summit, May 23-25 in Monterey, Calif. The event will host a select group of technology entrepreneurs, investors and corporate developers who will be the first to explore this next wave of disruptive technology companies…

After a long agony VMware shut down its newsgroups, the historical place where the virtualization community was born and grew.

Since a couple of week the company public news server news.vmware.com stopped answering and serving 23 newsgroups about Workstation, GSX and ESX Server.

Number of posts, NNTP communications limitations and articulated community needs definitively buried the first ever free support place for virtualization (the place where I learned so much and helped as much as possible).

No public announcement has been made.

Quoting from The Register:

Intel is to discontinue production of its two Virtualisation Technology-equipped Pentium 4 processors, the 662 and 672, the chip maker has told its customers. The two 90nm, LGA-775 chips only debuted in November 2005.

Intel documentation seen by Reg Hardware doesn’t reveal why the parts are being pulled, but it reveals the company won’t take orders for the 662 and 672 after 1 September – orders placed after 3 July can’t be cancelled. Intel will stop shipping the chips on 9 November 2007…

Read the whole article at source.

Ecora, US company known for compliancy automation and change management products, just started the beta program of its Enterprise Auditor for VMware ESX Server:

Auditor for VMware is powerful, configuration reporting and change management software. It automates the collection and detailed reporting of critical VMware configuration settings for cost-effectively sustain regulatory compliance, control changes, and improve security.

Download it here.

The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.

CRN published this news:

VMware plans to announce imminent availability of its ESX Server 3 and VirtualCenter 2 platform, along with a new per-user pricing model during the first week of June, sources said.
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Sources close to the Palo Alto, Calif., virtualization giant said VMware plans to offer aggressive pricing on its ESX Server 3 and launch a new per-user pricing model, in part to monetize its increasingly popular enterprise hosted desktop model.

They said VMware plans to disclose pricing to premier partners over the next two weeks…

The mentioned pricing disclosure to partners already happened as I learned from anonymous source.

The article continues with more details:

…VMware’s price per desktop is expected to be about $200 per user.
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VMware also is expected to announce a price cut for ESX Server 3, but it may not reduce overall costs for the combined platform since VirtualCenter 2’s advanced and sought-after services, Distributed Availability Service and Distributed Resource Scheduling, will be add-ons and priced separately from the overall platform price, sources said…

Read the whole article at source.

A short note on the Altiris community blog informs the Software Virtualization Solution (SVS) 2.0 Service Pack 1 beta program has started.

Just 2 new features are included:

• Support for WISE Package Studio (already anticipated in early May)
• OnEvent actions support

Read the whole Release Notes and download it here.

The virtualization.info Virtualization Industry Roadmap has been updated accordingly.