VM /ETC

Posts Tagged ‘Xen’

VMware Certified Professionals command higher salaries, report shows is SearchServerVirtualization.com blog written by Joe Foran that explores the value of the VCP certification. Joe uses indeed.com to create a graph that compares the average annual salary of today’s popular technical certifications to demonstrate that, as Joe puts it, “the VCP is as hot as ever”. I figured if Joe can do it I can do it too, so I used indeed.com to recreate basically the same salary comparison table for this post. Read the rest of this entry »

Is the mixed virtualization vendor data center possible? is Virtualization Pro blog that builds upon other discussions about the technical advantages and administrative logistics involved with the possibility of using different virtualization vendors in the same data center. In this post author Adam Trujillo expands on comments from other linked posts on the same topic – what types of applications and services might be best implemented on VMware ESX, Citrix Xenserver, or Microsoft’s Hyper-V, and how all of these virtual hosts could probably be used side by side by the same IT staff.

From Adam’s post:

“I threw out the notion that data center managers might use, for example, Hyper-V for end-user file servers; VMware ESX for apps that require dynamic load balancing, sophisticated disaster recovery and migration, and Xen for commodity Linux boxes.

The idea behind that supposition was to match your enterprise investments to appropriate workloads because, let’s face it, running everything on ESX is going to be expensive compared to other options. Big deal if you don’t get ESX-level features because you may get enterprise level features on silver-medal products.”

This post peaked my interest because I too have had similar discussions about the potential for a multi virtualization vendor data center, and I see it as a reality that architects, consultants, and administrators need to prepare for. My reasoning is not so much based on technical features, but on vendor optimization and support. Read the rest of this entry »

It is a saying made famous by former talk show host and comedian Arsenio Hall. It is the title of a C + C Music Factory dance hit. Now “Things that make you go hmmmm” will be a series of posts on VM /ETC that provide links and news related to virtualization, but that’s humorous, strange, or entertaining in nature. I’ll try to collect links and post them every Friday. Help me out if you find something that makes you go “hmmmm”.

So, without any further delay, pump your fist and say “Woof! Woof! Woof!” for the first set of links: Read the rest of this entry »

Compared to VMware ESX Enterprise Edition, business continuity and high availability features are lacking when deploying Citrix XenServer “out of the box.” Specifically, XenServer does not have the built in equivalent to VI3′s HA feature. Also missing is a solution similar to VMware’s soon to be released Site Recovery Manager (SRM). However, Marathon Technologies and XenSource (now a division of Citrix) have worked together to develop everRun VM as a enterprise class answer to fault tolerant availability for Windows virtual machines hosted on Citrix XenServer. According to Marathon’s Director of Products, Michael Bilancieri, at a recent Atlanta “Virtualization for the Real World” event, the integrated solution will be generally available sometime in the 2008 Q2/Q3 time frame.

Quoting from the Best of VMworld (more on this award later in this post) white paper downloadable from the everRun link above:

Read the rest of this entry »

A Few Thoughts on Xen posted on blog.scottlowe.org got me thinking about the pricing differences between Citrix XenServer and VMware ESX Server. It is a general assumption that Xen Server is more affordable than ESX. I decided to figure out exactly what the products cost and how they compare to each other. I am not factoring in the cost of Sales and Support in this post because I would want that regardless of which vendor I choose.

I found Citrix XenServer list pricing from a Citrix presentation slide deck that was presented to me via a webinar several weeks ago. Click on the image to see a larger version. Read the rest of this entry »

Try to see it once my way
Everything Zen
Everything Zen
I don’t think so

Bush – Everything Zen

Xen, XenSource, XenServer, and Zen. What are they? Which one do I use to virtualize my servers? What is Citrix’s product and how does it compare to VMware? These are my reasons for writing this post. Frankly, I was confused. After some intense meditation I decided to figure it out. Unfortunately, Lakers coach Phil Jackson was not available to help.

Wikipedia was where I started my journey. At first I was even more confused when I landed on the Xen (disambiguation) page: Read the rest of this entry »

IT20.info has created a good multi vendor virtual infrastructure feature comparison which can be found at Virtual Infrastructure products: features comparison.

What distinguishes this table from Wikipedia’s comparison is that it is focused only on hardware virtualization solutions that are the most relevant in the market today. The author has done a great job weeding out all the less known vendors and allows you to more easily compare VMware vs Microsoft vs Virtual Iron vs Citrix vs Xen.

John Troyer from VMTN Blog wrote about this matrix in his Virtual Technology Comparison post and brings up a great point: Read the rest of this entry »