Your IT budget is feeling the squeeze these days, and virtualization can be one of the best tools in your toolbox for keeping infrastructure expenses under control. With an eye toward maximizing your virtualization infrastructure and minimizing the impact on your bottom line, I've gathered more than a dozen useful virtualization tools and platforms to help you get the most out of your IT budget. And here's the best part: They're all free—as in no cost, no charge, and no fee required.
With Microsoft and VMware both offering their basic hypervisors for free, it was only a matter of time before more virtualization vendors followed suit by introducing no-charge apps and utilities. Now, a host of vendors are providing free versions of existing products, ranging from virtualization-management tools to performance and optimization solutions. Some of these apps are obviously geared toward convincing you to upgrade to a full-priced retail product, but some offer surprising amounts of functionality. (For more information about free virtualization tools and utilities, check out Michael Otey's "Free Virtualization Utilities" article.)
Free Virtualization Tools
If you’re already using a virtualization platform solution such as VMware ESX Server, Virtual Infrastructure 3 (VI3), Microsoft Hyper-V, or Citrix XenServer, many of these free tools can help you get the most out of your existing investment. Some work only with products from a particular vendor, but they all have one thing in common: They're free!
Veeam Monitor 3.0 Free Edition. When VMware slashed the price of ESXi to zero last year, it opened up its latest hypervisor-based virtualization technology to a much wider audience. Recognizing the need for a no-cost, real-time monitoring solution for ESX and ESXi environments, Veeam Software has introduced the Veeam Monitor Free Edition. According to Veeam, this app leverages the VMware API to keep tabs on ESX and ESXi environments, monitors resource allocation at the individual VM level, provides support for access by multiple administrators, allows for the creation of email alerts and alarms, and can correlate performance and event information. Veeam also touts the fact that the free edition of Veeam Monitor can connect directly to the VMware VM console. Find out more about the Veeam Monitor Free Edition at www.veeam.com.
Embotics V-Scout. Helping IT pros get the most out of VMware VirtualCenter is the focus of Embotics V-Scout 1.1, a free tool that aggregates and organizes information from up to two VMware VirtualCenter installations. V-Scout provides a single pane of glass for administrators to track and report on the performance of their VMs, discovers both online and offline VMs, generates VM population trend reports, and allows for the creation of standard and custom attributes when deploying VMs from clones or templates. If you're using VMware VirtualCenter, V-Scout should be at the top of your download list. Find out more about Embotics V-Scout at www.embotics.com.
Catbird Compliance Enforcer. "Security" and "compliance" are two words that can aggravate even the most seasoned IT pro. Throw a virtual data center in the mix, along with the need to keep all that virtual data secure and comliant with an avalanche of corporate and federal rules and regulations, and you have the perfect storm to create some serious IT pro indigestion. That's where Compliance Enforcer enters the picture. Offered as a free service, Compliance Enforcer can analyze your existing virtual infrastructure and highlight rogue VMs, quarantine suspect ones, and generate a host of compliance and security reports. Compliance Enforcer can be configured to monitor and enforce controls to keep your infrastructure in compliance with federal regulations (e.g., Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, GLBA), and can help keep your data secure by suggesting best practices for hardening your virtual infrastructure. Find out more about Catbird Compliance Enforcer at www.catbird.com.
Tripwire ConfigCheck and OpsCheck. As the most popular virtualization solution for larger enterprises, VMware's ESX Server and Virtual Infrastructure 3 (VI3) products have created a thriving ecosystem for free apps and utilities. In June 2008, Tripwire launched ConfigCheck, a free utility that can evaluate an ESX Server installation and ensure that it's configured properly and in accordance with VMware's best practices, particularly with regards to VM security guidelines. Tripwire followed up that success with the recent unveiling of another free application, OpsCheck, which troubleshoots configuration problems that might cause VMware VMotion to encounter problems. "Virtualization professionals are faced with unknown territory, requiring new tools to manage the complexities and risks of virtual environments," said Dan Schoenbaum, chief operating officer of products of Tripwire. “That’s why Tripwire is committed to developing utilities specifically for virtualization." Find out more about ConfigCheck at www.vwire.com/free-tools/configcheck and OpsCheck at www.vwire.com.
PlateSpin Recon Inventory Edition. Before you dive headfirst into your next virtualization project, one of your first steps should be to do a fair amount of planning and analysis to ensure that the strategy you’re considering works well with the needs of your organization. PlateSpin's Recon Inventory Edition profiles and analyzes your data center, then gathers up information about traffic, workload, asset inventory, and application services to give you a clear picture of what's actually happening in your data center. This free version supports up to 100 servers and supports hardware and software inventory for virtual servers running Linux, Sun Solaris, and Windows. Find out more about PlateSpin Recon Inventory Edition at www.platespin.com.
Vizioncore vOptimizer FreeWare. Virtualization brings many cost- and energy-saving benefits to the table, but the ease with which you can create, copy, and move VMs can quickly translate into mushrooming storage needs. Resource-hungry VMs gobbling up your available network storage can quickly reverse some of the gains that virtualization gives you in the first place. Vizioncore attempts to alleviate some of those pain points with Vizioncore vOptimizer Free Ware, a product that focuses on squeezing VMs—of both the Microsoft and VMware varieties—into more manageable sizes. Find out more about Vizioncore vOptimizer Free Ware at www.vizioncore.com.
Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit. Making the switch from physical to virtual servers is a task that often requires more careful planning and deliberation than many IT pros anticipate. That's why tools such as the free Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit come in so handy: They can help take most of the guesswork (and some of the labor) out of your next physical-to-virtual migration. This agentless toolkit searches out computers in your network, then generates a detailed inventory using WMI, SNMP, or the Remote Registry Service. Not only can this toolkit help you determine which servers to virtualize, it can also help you streamline the planning and migration to other Microsoft apps and services. Find out more about Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit at technet.microsoft.com.
EasyVMX. One of the easiest ways to create a VM is by using EasyVMX, a web-based VM-creation tool. To use EasyVMX, you simply visit the EasyVMX website, provide a few details about the VM you want to create—such as which OS you want to use, a description, network configuration, NIC and drive details, and so on—then click Create Virtual Machine. EasyVMX creates the VM per your specifications, then provides a download link. An enhanced feature set is in the offing for EasyVMX 2.0, which will include enhanced Windows Vista support, better auto-detection of sound and graphics hardware, Wake-on-LAN support for virtual network cards, and more. Find out more about EasyVMX at www.easyvmx.com.