The VMware Administrator s Guide to Hyper-V in Windows Server 2012 Brien Posey Microsoft MVMP @Veeam
About today s webinar Thought leadership content from an industry expert This webinar is recorded and you will get a link to replay the webinar as well as download slides. Ask questions!
About our speaker Nine time Microsoft MVP Freelance author and industry analyst since 2001 Formerly CIO for a national chain of hospitals and healthcare facilities Served as a network engineer for the DoD at Fort Knox Worked as a network administrator for some of the country s largest insurance companies
Agenda Why bother learning Hyper-V? Hyper-V and VMware basics Hyper-V equivalents to VMware features
Full disclosure I am a Microsoft MVP and work with Hyper-V on a daily basis. This presentation is not about convincing you to switch to Hyper-V, or about which hypervisor is better. The purpose of this presentation is to expose VMware admins to Hyper-V and Visa Versa.
Why learn Hyper-V? VMware is the undisputed leader of the server virtualization market for now. Hyper-V 3.0 and VMware 5 are more similar than many admins realize. Heterogeneous hypervisor environments are sure to become more common Hyper-V costs less and is less expensive. You might encounter Hyper-V as a result of: Corporate mergers Internal transitions Low budget projects
A basic deployment VMware VMware uses a self contained OS that installs directly on a dedicated server. Hyper-V Although there is a standalone version of Hyper-V, most Hyper-V deployments run as a service on top of a parent Windows OS.
Hardware considerations VMware Requires a 64-bit CPU with hardware level virtualization Very limited support for SATA drives Requires dedicated storage for the datastore Hyper-V Requires a 64-bit CPU with hardware level virtualization Works with SATA, SAS, and SSDs Doesn t technically require dedicated storage, but best practice is to use dedicated storage
Scalability VMware vsphere 5 Hyper-V 3.0 Maximum RAM supported within a VM 1 TB 512 GB Maximum virtual hard disk size 2 TB 16 TB if using VHDX Maximum number of virtual CPUs per virtual machine 32 32 The maximum number of virtual machines per host that can be powered on at any given time 512 1024 Maximum number of virtual machines in a cluster 3000 4000 Maximum number of hosts per cluster 32 63 Maximum RAM per host server 2 TB 2 TB
Interacting with the hypervisor VMware Basic configuration is performed through the server console VM configuration and management is performed though the vsphere Client Hyper-V Basic configuration is performed through the Hyper-V Manager (on the server) VM configuration and management is performed through the Hyper-V Manager or through Windows PowerShell.
Virtual machines VMware Hyper-V Enlightenment VMware Tools Integration Services Settings Right click on the VM in the vsphere client and choose Edit Settings Right click on the VM in the Hyper- V Manager and choose Settings
Advanced features The features discussed so far represent the most basic aspects of server virtualization. Both Hyper-V and VMware offer a number of advanced features that are designed to make server virtualization practical in a production environment. Many of these features exist on both platforms, but have different names.
Hyper-V main areas of improvement Memory Storage Networking High Availability Disaster Recovery
Memory Memory over commitment Memory ballooning
Memory over commitment Memory over commitment allows virtual machines to be collectively assigned more memory than is physically present in the host, allowing for greater VM density. VMware has had a memory over commitment feature for quite some time. Microsoft introduced memory over commitment in Hyper-V 2.0 (Windows Server 2008 R2).
Memory ballooning Memory ballooning allows VMs to release unused memory after the initial boot process completes. Memory ballooning is supported by both VMware and Hyper-V
Storage Storage support Storage migrations Concurrent storage migrations Low cost storage options Offload Data Transfer
Storage support Block level storage VMware iscsi and Fibre Channel Hyper-V File system storage NFS SMB iscsi and Fibre Channel
Storage migrations Storage migration refers to the ability to move a running virtual machine from one host to another. Microsoft refers to this as Live Migration. VMware calls it vmotion. Live Migration was introduced in Hyper-V 2.0 (Windows Server 2008 R2). Hyper-V 3.0 still offers live migration, but removes the requirement for shared storage.
Concurrent storage migrations VMware allows for 2 concurrent storage migrations per datastore and up to 8 concurrent migrations per host. Concurrent live migrations are new to Hyper-V 3.0, which supports an unlimited number of simultaneous live migrations.
Low cost storage options VMware use vsphere Storage Appliance (VSA). Creates shared storage from local disks Additional license is required. Hyper-V Shared storage is not required in version 3.0 Hosts can use local storage.
Offloaded data transfer Both VMware and Hyper-V can offload file transfers to the storage hardware VMware uses VAAI (vstorage API for Array Integration) Hyper-V / Windows Server 2012 use Offloaded Data Transfer (ODX)
Networking NIC Teaming Extensible Virtual Switch
NIC teaming NIC teaming allows multiple physical NICs to work together to achieve higher bandwidth and fault tolerance. NIC teaming is supported by VMware and Hyper-V 3.0. Earlier versions of Hyper-V allowed NIC teaming, but only at the hardware level.
Extensible virtual switch The extensible virtual switch lets third party vendors to build extensions for the virtual switch. This will allow virtual switches to be monitored and managed in a manner similar to that used for physical switches. VMware and Hyper-V both offer an extensible virtual switch.
High availability Failover Clustering Migration of running virtual machines Concurrent migrations Live migration Beyond the cluster Controllable virtual machine placement
Failover clustering
Failover Clustering VMware Hyper-V Feature Name VMware HA Failover Clustering Maximum Number of Nodes Maximum Number of Virtual Machines per Cluster Shared Storage Supported 32 63 3000 4000 Yes Yes Shared Storage Required Yes No
Concurrent virtual machine migrations vmotion 2 per datastore, 8 per host (4 on a 1 Gigabit connection, 8 on a 10 gigabit connection) Live Migration Unlimited in Hyper-V 3.0, but bandwidth must be considered. Limited to 1 in Hyper-V 2.0
Live Migration Beyond the cluster Hyper-V 3.0 has the ability to live migrate virtual machines to nodes that exist outside of the cluster. VMware does not yet have this capability.
Controllable virtual machine placement It is sometimes necessary to control virtual machine placement during failover. Some VMs must reside on the same host. Other VMs should never reside on the same host. If a host is overloaded VMs must be prioritized to control which VMs start and which do not. VMware Hyper-V Host rules, Affinity rules, and Anti-Affinity rules Cluster properties can be configured with Affinity and Anti-Affinity rules. VM startup can be prioritized.
Disaster recovery Incremental block level backups Disaster recovery options Snapshot merge
Incremental block level backups VMware Based on Change Block Tracking Hyper-V Windows Server 2012 supports incremental backups of virtual hard disks.
Replication-based disaster recovery options Feature Licensing VMware vcenter Site Recovery Manager Requires additional license Hyper-V Hyper-V Replica Built-in to Hyper-V 3.0
Snapshot support VMware Hyper-V 2.0 Hyper-V 3.0 Snapshots can be deleted or merged without restarting the VM. Snapshots were fully supported, but could only be deleted or merged while the VM was offline. Snapshots can be deleted or merged while the virtual machine is running.
Hot resource allocation Hot resource allocation refers to adding physical resources to a VM while it is running. VMware Hyper-V Memory Yes Yes Disk Yes Yes CPU Cores Yes No
Conclusion Hyper-V is finally becoming a contender Virtualization admins may soon have to support both platforms
Q&A Thank you for attending!