|
Volume Two
Issue
#6
| |
|
|
|
Welcome |
|
 September
was a big month for virtualization news.
Microsoft stepped up its Hyper-V announcements
and VMware held its big VMworld conference and
show in Las Vegas.
In
this edition of Optimize
Now, Erwin Solis takes a
detailed look at VMware's ESX Server versus
Microsoft's Hyper-V. He addresses the pros
and cons of each, from a cost and
technical view. If you're not knee-deep in
virtualization just yet, chances are good you
will be soon, so this article will be a useful
tool for you.
Thanks
for reading, and please send us your
comments. | |
| | |
|
VMware's
ESX Server VS. Microsoft's
Hyper-V |
|
Advancements
in CPU performance with multi-core designs are making
the drive towards virtualization stronger than ever. Now
that Microsoft's Hyper-V has been out for little while
and I've completely familiarized myself with it, I
thought it was a good time to compare with VMware's ESX
Server.
This
comparison covers 4 key areas:
1) Performance
2) Usability / Ease
of use
3) Features /
Functionality
4) Cost Effectiveness
Performance
First,
I'd like to point out that this comparison will slant
heavily towards cost. This is intended to be a no
nonsense comparison, and the reality of the situation
for most organizations, is that $$$ is the bottom line.
So for the purposes of this comparison, cost
effectiveness is top priority.
For this reason,
testing was done on two different sets of hardware.
Microsoft's solution will run on any hardware on which
Server 2008 will install. This is because it uses the
existing Windows driver model on which its Guest
machines run. VMware's ESX, on the other hand, uses a
fixed driver configuration, so options for compatible
hardware are limited.
Now you might think this
would slant the comparison with respect to performance,
given that greater opportunities exist with Hyper=V with
respect to faster hardware. But ESX directly supports
the fastest of Rack/Blades systems and because the focus
is on cost, Hyper-V takes an immediate lead in this
contest.
I was able use a Quad-Core Intel setup
for Hyper-V on a Gigabyte motherboard. This setup was
approximately $430 less than the cheapest comparable ESX
hardware configuration, which was a Dual Quad-Core, Xeon
processor setup on an Intel server board.
I
could have gone with Dual-Core AMD processors for both,
but was limited by the fact that ESX did not have
compatible drivers available for many of the SCSI and
SATA controllers I had available. This highlighted for
me the advantage of using the existing Windows driver
model with Hyper-V. So while I could have chosen a
significantly slower machine for Server 2008, I moved up
to the Quad-Core setup for the sake of having comparable
performance to the cheapest ESX capable platform I could
find. All hard drives were of identical
make/model.
Could
the higher cost of the ESX setup be justified in
performance? The results I came up with would indicate a
definite "No".
Performance testing was done with
SYSmark 2007, on a Windows XP SP3 Guest machine. All
host volumes and the Guest volumes were defragged with
PerfectDisk 2008. On each host, 1 guest machine was run
on a two disk, RAID-0 configuration. Each Host was home
to 8GB of RAM, and each Guest machine was granted 2 CPUs
and 2GB of RAM.
A physical reference system was
also tested, using comparable hardware to that of the
Guest Machines. The higher Virtual scores underline the
performance benefits of hosting the guest machines on
superior hardware.
Final scores are listed
below.
As you can see, and
as expected, ESX outperformed Hyper-V under these
circumstances. Of course, having access to twice the
number of CPU Cores, each with a bit more on board cache
makes less of a difference than one might expect.
The gap would have been wider had we loaded them both up
with 5 or more Guests.
But with just a single
Guest, scores are very close, strongly suggesting that
given additional CPU cores with equally sized caches,
our Hyper-V machine could close the gap.
Ease of Use
This
is a definite win for ESX. From start to finish, this is
by far the easiest solution to get up and running,
assuming you don't run into any driver issues. But even
if you did, once resolved the rest of the experience
would be pointedly smoother. The management tools for
ESX are better fleshed out, more intuitive and flexible.
Hyper-V forces you to use the standard MMC interface and
Microsoft obviously has not had enough time to mold it
for this server role. VMware designed their interface
specifically for its solution and it
shows.
Features
ESX
wins again, primarily because of its VMotion capability,
though Hyper-V does allow you to reallocate Guest
machines with relative ease its still a matter of
suspending machines and then resuming them on another
host. Most other features are identical, but ease of use
comes into play heavily here and so Hyper-V loses out.
Cost
Effectiveness
The
Hyper-V edition of Windows Server 2008 is just $28 more
than the non-Hyper-V capable version. This makes Hyper-V
dirt cheap, and VMware prices are quite high when you
take into account that you have to pay for Virtual
Center Server and its VMotion capability. The end result
is that ESX is more expensive overall, but not
prohibitively so until you scale things up. A standard
license will run you about $3,500 and an Enterprise
license will run you just under $7,000, and that's just
for two processors. It should be noted that a VMware
offers a free version called ESXi, but its management
capabilities and features are limited, making it a far
less than attractive alternative.
Conclusion
VMware
still has the performance edge. Its features and ease of
use put it decidedly ahead of Hyper-V as a solution.
Cost wise, Hyper-V makes a huge impact especially
considering that the performance is practically moot.
And while Hyper-V leaves much to be desired with respect
to usability and functionality, it is an exceptionally
solid solution. There is no doubt that Microsoft will
continue to evolve Hyper-V and that if the first attempt
is anything to go by, they will soon match VMware
feature for
feature.
Microsoft
needs to find ways to leverage cost savings because in
the end, no one will migrate over to Hyper-V given
identical features and functionality. Microsoft needs to
give organizations a good reason to undertake such a
task. For anyone looking to get their organization up to
speed on Virtualization, it's considerably cheaper to
get started with Hyper-V, and in the long run that may
prove to be the smarter choice. After all, if you go
with Hyper-V now, and then decide to switch to ESX,
you're only losing out on $28 bucks. The same can't be
said if you choose VMware's solution today, only to
switch to Microsoft in the end.
That said, if you
want the best solution now and price is not the
strongest consideration for you or your organization,
then this comparison can be viewed in an entirely
different light - where it is obvious that VMware is
still
king. |
If
you haven't already done so, don't forget to subscribe
to our newsletter mailing list above so that you'll
continue to receive future issues.
Optimize
Now Newsletter
Raxco Software,
Inc. | |
|
Raxco
Software Inc | 6 Montgomery Village Ave. | Gaithersburg | MD |
20879 | | |
