The Switch Is On: Are You Moving to Hyper-V?
Nearly six months after Microsoft has shipped Windows Server 2012 R2, a growing number of IT pros now believe the Hyper-V hypervisor is ready for prime time. A growing number of third parties and IT pros say it's now practical to use Hyper-V for business-critical workloads.
Before the current release of Hyper-V 3.0, that wasn't the case. While Hyper-V was suitable for various workloads, most enterprises were reluctant to use it for heavy duty virtualization. And even those that were using it certainly weren't displacing existing hypervisors, especially VMware's ESX.
It's not that many shops weren't intrigued by the thought of using Hyper-V, which Microsoft has offered free of charge with Windows Server since 2008. It's just that it lacked the robustness and management capabilities offered by VMware. Many say while VMware still has a technical edge over Hyper-V, the gap has narrowed to the point that it's suitable for a growing number of mainstream use cases. It's even more appealing for those considering Microsoft's hybrid cloud strategy, called Cloud OS, that makes it easier to bridge Windows Server to Azure using Hyper-V.
Microsoft this week moved to make it easier to migrate VMware infrastructure to Hyper-V with the release of Virtual Machine Converter 2.0. The free tool lets IT pros migrate VMware-based virtual machines and virtual disks to Hyper-V-based VMs and virtual hard disks (VHDs).
"Virtual machine migration is an increasing priority for many customers as more and more are exploring and evaluating the Microsoft platform against their existing VMware installed base," the company said in a blog post from its server and cloud team. "Whether it's virtual to virtual (from one hypervisor to another) or physical to virtual, migration provides customers a path for consolidation of workloads and services, and the foundation for cloud."
The new VM Converter 2.0 supports V-Center and ESX 5.5, VMware virtual hardware version 4 through 10 support and Linux guest OS migration support including CentOS, Debian, Oracle, Red Hat Enterprise, SuSE enterprise and Ubuntu. Microsoft also pointed to two new features. The first is an on-premises VM to Azure VM conversion tool, which lets IT pros migrate their VMware VMs directly to Azure. It also now includes a PowerShell interface for scripting and automation support, letting IT pros automate migration processes with workflow tools including System Center Orchestrator, among others, Microsoft said.
Microsoft also said MVVC 3.0, slated for this fall, will add physical-to-virtual (P2V) machine conversion for supported versions of Windows.
Do you plan to make the switch or are you sticking with VMware (or looking at KVM or other alternative hypervisors)? Share your views in the comment section below or drop me a line at [email protected].
Posted by Jeffrey Schwartz on 04/11/2014 at 11:23 AM