RED HAT ENTERPRISE VIRTUALIZATION COMPARISON WITH VMWARE VSPHERE 5.5 AND MICROSOFT HYPER-V 2012
FEATURES | RED HAT ENTERPRISE VIRTUALIZATION | VMWARE VSPHERE 5.5 | MICROSOFT HYPER-V 2012 |
HYPERVISOR Bare-metalhypervisorcanbe installed directlyontheserver hardwarewithoutafull operating system. | Y | Y | Y |
Smallfootprintof<200MB | Y | Y | N |
Guest device drivers are optimized for virtualization, resulting in high performance network and disk operations. | Y | Y | Y Red Hat Enterprise Linux guests require installation of the Linux integration services. |
Certified on all hardware certified for Red Hat Enterprise Linux, including the latest Intel Xeon and AMD Opteron chipsets | Y | Y | Y |
SCALABILITY LIMITS | |||
Per Cluster | |||
Cluster | 200 | 32 | 64 |
Per Host | |||
Max cores per host | 160 | 160 | 160 |
Max Ram per host | 3TB/host | 4TB/host | 4TB/host |
Max virtual CPUs per host | No limit | 4096 | 2048 |
Per virtual machine (VM) | |||
Max vCPUs per VM | 160 vCPU/vm | 32 vCPU with standard or Enterprise Edition 64 vCPU with Enterprise Plus Edition | 64 vCPUs/VM for Win 2012, Win 2008, and Win 7 32 vCPUs/VM for Linux requires the installation of the new Linux integration services |
Max vRAM per VM | 2TB/VM | 1TB/VM | 1TB/VM |
GUEST OS SUPPORT | |||
Guest OS Support | Windows Server 2003, 2008, 2010, 2012, Windows XP, 7 and 8 (32bit and 64bit) Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3, 4, 5, 6 (x86 and x64) Vendor support for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10, 11 Other OS are known to work and are community supported | Windows, Linux, UNIX (x86 and x64) Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8 | Windows 2003, 2008, 2012 (certain SPs only) Windows XP, Vista, 7, and 8 SLES Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5+, 6+ (certain releases only) |
MEMORY MANAGEMENT | |||
Memory overcommitment: Allows the allocation of more virtual memory to its VMs than the host has physical memory | Y | Y | Y dynamic memory only available with some Microsoft operating systems |
Memory page sharing: Enables VMs with similar operating systems to share physical memory | Y | Y | N |
Transparent huge pages: Large memory pages can be dynamically created for VMs that require them | Y | Y | N |
MANAGEMENT FEATURES | |||
High Availability | |||
VM restart in case of host failure | Y | Y | Y |
Restart order can be prioritized, allowing the most critical VMs to be restarted first | Y | Y | Y |
No single point of failure for high availability | Y | Y | Y |
Maintenance mode: Guest VMs of hosts undergoing maintenance are automatically migrated to other available hosts | Y | Y | Y |
High availability for enterprise management module: Automatic fail over to stand-by management server in the event of a primary server failure | Y | Y | Y |
MIGRATION | |||
VM live migration | Y | Y | Y |
Storage live migration | Y | Y Requires Enterprise or Enterprise Plus | Y |
WORKLOAD AND RESOURCE MANAGEMENT | |||
System scheduler: Cluster policies automatically distribute workload evenly across cluster host servers | Y | Y requires Enterprise or Enterprise Plus | Y |
Power saver: During off-peak hours, concentrates VMs on fewer hosts to save power | Y | Y requires Enterprise or Enterprise Plus | Y |
Storage load balancing: Automatically balance storage I/O and storage capacity | Y | Y requires Enterprise Plus | Y |
Shared resource pools: CPU, memory, and storage resources are aggregated and managed at the cluster level. | Y | Y | Y |
Hot add VM NICs, Disk: Add networks and disk storage to running VMs | Y | Y requires Enterprise or Enterprise Plus | Y |
Hot add VM vCPUs and RAM: Add more vCPUs and RAM to running VM (guest operating system and application must support feature) | N | Y requires Enterprise or Enterprise Plus | N |
IMAGE MANAGEMENT | |||
Thin provisioning: Virtual disks don’t use all of their allowed space upon creation. | Y | Y | Y |
Templates: VMs can be deployed from master installations. | Y | Y | Y |
VM snapshots: Roll back patches and upgrades | Y | Y | Y |
Live VM snapshots: Snapshot a running VM | Y | Y | Y |
Import/export VMs in the standard OVF format | Y | Y | Y |
VM conversion: Includes tools to convert VMs from other formats to native format | Y | Y | Y |
VM backup: Certified third-party solutions are available for backing up virtual servers (for both data and operating system backup). | Y | Y | Y |
SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION AND CONTROL | |||
Single view for centralized control | Y | Y | N requires multiple management tools |
Host and VM system monitoring and management | Y | Y | Y |
Self service user portal: Provides administrative access to users for creating/running VMs and managing the environment | Y | N requires purchase of VMware Lab Manager deprecated or vCloud Director with Enterprise Plus | Y limited capability through SC2012 App Controller |
Roles and permissions: Granular, inheritable, directory-based security roles for all actions and objects | Y | Y | N requires Authorization Manager |
Identity management: User authentication domains supported | Y choice of Active directory, IPA, Red Hat Directory Services, or IBM Tivoli Directory Server | Y | Y AD only |
Remote console: Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization Manager includes access to VMs using a secure graphical console | Y | Y | Y |
Remote network boot via PXE (Preboot Execution Environment) | Y | Y | Y |
REPORTING AND MONITORING | |||
Provides customizable reporting for historic usage, trending, and quality of service | Y | N Requires vCenter CapacityIQ | Y LIMITED |
Alerts and notifications: Errors and warnings are immediately reported to administrators via email | Y | Y | Y |
Logging: Supports remote logging and crash analysis | Y | Y | Y |
Guest agents: Enables monitoring of VM health and status | Y | Y | Y |
INTEGRATION, AUTOMATION, AND CUSTOMIZATION | |||
API: Programmatic access to all management commands | Y all open | N some proprietary/closed, some open | N some proprietary/closed, some open |
Scripting and automation of management commands | Y Linux Python-based CLI | Y Powershell-based CLI | Y Powershell-based CLI |
Hooks: Used to run system commands or to execute scripts that modify VM operation | Y | Y LIMITED | N |
SECURITY | |||
Kernel level: Includes SELinux and sVirt for an effective intrusion detection, isolation, and containment | Y | N application layer security with add-on vShield products | N application layer security |
Small hypervisor footprint minimizes attack surface | Y | Y | Y |
NETWORKING | |||
Device support: All network hardware and interfaces are certified for Red Hat Enterprise Linux | Y | Y | Y |
vLANs: Support for virtual LANs are inside the virtual infrastructure | Y | Y | Hyper-V Network Virtualization |
Support for OpenStack Neutron networking | Y Supports OpenvSwitch and Linux Bridge 2 | N Only supports VMware NSX 3 | Y Supports OpenvSwitch 4 |
Network offload: Offloads virtual networking and network I/O to compatible NIC hardware | Y | Y | Y |
Supports jumbo frames | Y | Y | Y |
STORAGE | |||
Supports iSCSI, FC, and NFS shared storage infrastructure | Y | Y | Y |
Includes native support for Red Hat Storage Server, including a built-in GlusterFS Storage domain and datacenter type that use Gluster as the storage back-end | Y | N | N |
Storage multipathing: Redundant path to storage for fault tolerance and enhanced performance | Y | Y | Y |
Local disk support | Y | Y | Y |
Supports storage domains backed by POSIX-compliant file systems | Y | Y | Y |
Shared disks: Includes disks that are shared by multiple VMs at the same time | Y | Y | Y |
Direct LUN support: Provides the ability to directly attach any block device to a VM as a disk | Y | Y | Y |