Windows® Server 2008 Hyper-V
Windows Server 2008 is the next-generation Windows Server operating system. Included with Windows Server 2008 is Hyper-V, a hypervisor-based virtualization technology that is a key feature of Windows Server 2008. Hyper-V helps customers consolidate server hardware, improve server utilization, increase server automation, and enhance system portability. Additionally, Hyper-V reduces hardware costs and power consumption.
Administrators want flexibility in allocating computing resources for specific tasks. Virtualization technologies provide this flexibility by decoupling the hardware from the workload being performed. Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V offers a robust, scalable hypervisor-based virtualization platform allowing enterprises to provision and manage virtual server workloads. Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V offers the following benefits over Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2:
- Full integration with Windows Server 2008 (installed as server role)
- Support for both 64-bit and 32-bit guest operating systems
- Ability to assign up to four virtual CPUs and 32 GB RAM to each guest OS
- Improved management interface and integration with Microsoft System Center
- Extensible VMBus architecture that improves performance by lowering the overhead of guest OS I/O
The following scenarios as target environments for Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V:
- Production Server Consolidation: Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V can be beneficial for organizations wanting to consolidate servers to better utilize hardware resources or reduce power and space constraints in their data centers
- Business Continuity Management: Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V can minimize the impact of unscheduled downtime for an efficient and flexible disaster recovery solution
- Software Test and Development: Administrators can allocate a child partition to development resources to reduce the amount of server hardware required in the data center
- Dynamic Data center: Administrators will have the capability to dynamically add resources to virtual machines and move them across physical machines without affecting users
A beta version of Hyper-V is included with Windows Server 2008 RTM for x64 editions. Customers must download and install the final released version of Hyper-V before using it in a production environment. All HP branded versions of Windows Server 2008 include support for Hyper-V. The final released version of Hyper-V can be downloaded from www.microsoft.com/hyper-v.
Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V uses an advanced feature of processors known as hardware-assisted virtualization. On Intel-based ProLiant servers, this feature, referred to as Intel® Virtualization Technology, or VT-x. For AMD-based ProLiant servers, this feature is called AMD-Virtualization, or AMD-V. Due to the hardware requirements for Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, not every ProLiant server platform will support Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V. To see the list of supported ProLiant servers, as well as additional configuration and installation requirements, please refer to the “Implementing Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V on HP ProLiant Servers” integration note, which can be found here.
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- The Microsoft Assessment and Planning tool (MAP) is an inventory, assessment, and reporting tool that can securely run in small or large IT environments without requiring the installation of agent software on any computers or devices. It can show which servers can be consolidated and virtualized.
- The Microsoft Virtualization ROI Tool was developed to educate and empower your customers to make informed strategic decisions regarding their infrastructure and long term virtualization investments. This tool will support a compelling, credible business case to monetarily quantifying the value of Integrated Virtualization Optimization and the cost-benefit of Microsoft and Partner solutions. The ROI tool empowers the customer and partners to accelerate their virtualization projects by providing a clear analysis of current improvement opportunities and calculates potential benefits.
- The Windows Server Virtualization Calculators provide two ways to estimate the number and cost of Windows Server Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition and Datacenter Edition licenses needed for your virtualization scenarios to help you determine the most cost-effective edition of Windows Server. Note that although this calculator is for Windows Server 2003, it can also be used for Windows Server 2008 and Hyper-V.
- Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007 (VMM) is a comprehensive management solution for the virtualized data center. Designed to scale up for the largest organizations, VMM provides comprehensive support for consolidating physical servers onto virtual infrastructure, and rapid provisioning and deployment of new virtual machines. To help IT administrators keep organized, VMM features a complete library to centrally manage the building blocks of the virtual data center. A beta version of System Center VMM 2008 supporting Hyper-V is now available.
- View the Microsoft TechNet Webcast on "Using Virtual Machine Manager and Windows PowerShell to Deploy HP Windows Server 2008 Academy Labs".
- View the Microsoft TechNet Webcast on "Managing Hyper-V Virtual Machines with WMI and Windows PowerShell"
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