RSSHyper-V Server now available as a free download
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published October 1, 2008, 6:54 PM
It isn't like Microsoft to give away an entire operating system for free, but beginning today, it will: A stand-alone server whose sole purpose is to be a hypervisor platform for virtualized guest operating systems, is now available free of charge.
Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 is now available in a stand-alone edition that installs on "bare metal," not even requiring Windows Server (existing versions have been Windows Server add-ons). The new version enables server hardware -- especially the kind with built-in virtualization support on its CPU -- to run one or more virtualized operating systems in a virtualized environment.
The company's gamble is that what could conceivably have sold for about $40 can be written off as an investment in the customer, especially if it encourages him to consolidate data centers by installing more than one running instance of Windows on a processor.
Last August, Microsoft announced changes to its Windows licensing scheme, amid the new reality that running server instances can traverse the boundaries of active processors. Today, the company's new Hyper-V page lists the Windows licensing options now that a stand-alone Hyper-V has entered the mix.
Each Standard edition of Windows Server 2008 licenses the use of one physical copy of Windows, plus one virtual machine. The Enterprise edition expands that number to four virtual machines, while the Datacenter edition enables unlimited VMs. These are running instances of Windows that may traverse processor boundaries at any time; the per-processor licensing model has effectively been sacked.
But Hyper-V Stand-alone doesn't include any Windows licenses, so any guest operating system you run under this particular edition must be licensed individually, including Windows.
Or you can read Network World's Sept 29 article entitled: VMWare's ESX KOsMicrosoft's Hyper-V in virtualization face-off
www.nwdocfinder.com/6721
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|Great!
Hey, Toolie - how about you try migrating your WHS to this thing and letting us know how it goes..?
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|It requires a bit more power than my home desktop can offer, I am afraid.
No sane user would run this without a SCSI controller and drives in anything but a dedicated server....
My WHS server is currently sitting on an old HP. ;) (Still waiting for some decent "plug-ins"...)
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|I got mine on a fairly spiffy quad core. It does a good job as file, print, scan, media server. A couple of TB on SATA should be good enough or am I missing something? It's also running a couple of VMs hosted on a different product running on top of WHS. I'd prefer being able to run these things in parallel but don't want to spend a lot of time tinkering and HV might be the way to go.
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|It is recommended for Hyper-V that each VHD be on a separate physical drive (not pooled/RAID) to reduce I/O conflicts, and they suggest SCSI for the faster I/O/spindle speeds.
My WHS has been sitting in the back closet now for over a year with no real tinkering to speak of from me. Got bored with it. Still holds all the data, still does what I need it to do, and technically, that's exactly how it should be, right?
I've got *one* VM on my home system (Ubuntu), and one on my work desktop (DSL Server for RDP).
I just don't really see a need for Hyper-V outside the server rack...
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|Asoft Autoexit is a pretty sweet plugin
gives you more options then the standard whs
allows you to remote (provided the os supports it, damn vista home prem)
can turn the pcs off, sleep, hibernate from anywhere in the house
can easily remote into the server if need be (I use this a lot because windows media connect doesn't play well with ps3 so I had to modify a few files to get wmp11 to install
Can send a msg and see all pcs online and their ips.
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|Sounds like a good one...but again, I don't mess with it that much. We shut down our systems when we're not using them, so the power management would be pretty useless to us.
We've got 5 systems on this thing now. The last time I messed with it was adding a drive to the pool.
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|Well, obviously for a commercial/production system this makes sense but for a home server running one or another VM the rig seems fine.
It would just be nice to decouple WHS (also just sitting there minding its own business) from those other instances and have a hypervisor schedule resources on demand.
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|OMG!
SCSI! That means either an OLD Mac, or an...and I shudder to use the term...and typical enterprise class server...
Say it ain't so? ;-)
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|Oh, right...
Because I don't know *anything* about working with servers....
Haha...that was funny.
//sarcasm
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|VMWare Server requires an OS to run on. That shoulda been a reply to below.
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|Considering VMWare Server has been free for ~ 3 years already, it would be a bit hard to compete by charging for it.
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|MS Virtual Server was free too. This is a little different and compares more with ESX, but now that ESXi is free I think it forced their hand.
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|This is more comprabale to ESX than VMWare server (although ofcourse ESX is much superior). But...you're never very accurate in your comments anyway, so this is pretty expected.
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|Poor baby!
But anyone who deals with either VMWare or the enterprise already knows this, and both server configs from VMWare are free!
oh...
But then, when we talk about enterprise class systems Tool and others whine, and when we don't, everyone whines.
And as we are informed that no one here understands the financial aspects of IT, it never stops the idiots from posting on matters of the economy, does it?
Just go back to blindly worshipping MS and play your games.
Tool was right, too many choices does confuse the average Windows user as is evidenced by your response and your ignorance of the line.
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|FOXFYRE:
Considering VMWare Server has been free for ~ 3 years already, it would be a bit hard to compete by charging for it.
NIRO:
This is more comprabale to ESX than VMWare server
FOXFYRE:
anyone who deals with either VMWare or the enterprise already knows this
So...what you're saying is that you don't deal with VMWare or the enterprise?
Still flaming me every chance you get, eh? I suppose anyone who exposes your inability to discuss anything logically becomes an instant target, hmm?
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|"I suppose anyone who exposes your inability to discuss anything logically becomes an instant target, hmm?"
*ding ding ding*
Winner, winner, chicken dinner! ;)
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