Most of VMM 2008’s advanced tools are
accessible via simple wizards. The Migrate
Virtual Machine Wizard rates potential target
hosts in a migration and lets you easily
pick an appropriate destination. Migration
of Hyper-V–based VMs is not instantaneous,
but is nearly so; migration of ESX Server VMs,
however, is instantaneous thanks to that system’s
live migration facilities. (Live Migration
is coming to Hyper-V in Windows Server 2008
R2.) Every wizard has a View Script button, so
you can see the PowerShell code that’s being
generated under the hood and apply it to
your own scripts.
In use, VMM 2008’s library is a veneer
over the underlying file system. As you navigate
through subfolders such as ISOs, Scripts, Templates, and VHDs, you’re seeing a representation
of these objects as they are literally
stored in Explorer.
The VMM 2008 Self-Service Portal is
interesting as well. This web application lets
end users start, stop, and pause VMs, make
check points, and perform other related
actions, all without involving a support call.
Available VMs can be shown in a text-based
list view or a more graphical thumbnail view,
which provides a live glimpse into the running
VMs.
A primary advantage of VMM 2008 over
VMware tools is that Microsoft can see further
into each VM than can its competition.
Thanks to the System Center management
pack integration, you can dig into each VM
and manage the underlying workloads as
well.
So whereas VMware is limited to identifying
the OS utilized by the VM, VMM 2008
can go further and, for example, determine
whether Microsoft IIS is installed. Then you
can view the event log and perform other
lower-level work.
Recommendations
VMM 2008 is a sophisticated solution and
is far more capable than the freebie Hyper-
V Manager, as expected. But what makes
VMM 2008 so compelling is its interoperability
prowess: It works with all of Microsoft’s
virtualization servers and with VMware ESX
Server. It integrates with System Center and
provides a seamless, centralized management
interface for physical and virtual
machines. And it can utilize the failover
and high-availability features of Server 2008
to provide data-center–ready virtualized
environments. Ultimately, VMM 2008 will
most interest those who manage large data
centers. But it will make deploying and
managing virtualized environments easier
for businesses of all sizes.
Paul Thurott (thurrott@windowsitpro.com) is the news editor for Windows IT Pro.
He writes a weekly editorial for Windows IT Pro
UPDATE (www.windowsitpro.com/email) and
a daily Windows news and information
newsletter called WinInfo Daily UPDATE
(www.wininformant.com).