Virtual computing goes mainstream for all

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Wednesday, 19 September 2007 13:20

Opinion and Analysis

ESX 3i is VMware’s newest ‘hypervisor’, a program that sits above operating systems on a server and organizes the virtualization technology underneath to run multiple operating systems, share resources and more. ESX 3i differs from the existing ESX 3 by removing the Linux operating system. This has shrunken the ESX package from nearly 2GB – most of which was Linux – to only 32MB – small enough to fit on a 32MB compact flash card, which is now being built into servers from many of the major server vendors.

Most of the updates that VMware were creating for ESX 3 were security updates for Linux. By reducing the hypervisor to its core and having it built into the server hardware itself, the avenue for attack is vastly smaller, allowing VMware and hardware partners to claim better security benefits, too.

This has transformed virtualization into a standard part of the server, not something you have to add on later - although there is other software required to take full advantage of virtualization - a hypervisor alone is not enough, but it is the essential element. ESX 3i also takes full advantage of the virtualization friendly features of the latest Intel and AMD processors, which have been built to seamlessly work with virtualization software. Hardware that comes with ESX 3i pre-installed is due before the end of the year, with more to come in 2008.

Desktop virtualization technology allows companies to have their employees’ computers able to be started on any Internet connected computer if so desired. By having a virtual desktop, you can just move to another computer and start up your virtual desktop if the physical computer on your desk fails, or is attacked by malware or a virus. It helps companies to extend the lifespan of existing hardware and make their computing resources infinitely more flexible, while centralizing management, backup and security updates much more efficiently than when dealing with hundreds or thousands of physical desktop computers.

Site recovery allows businesses to ‘fail over’ to a backup data center with ease, ensuring a company’s IT back-end is restored within minutes instead of days, although this does not include the backup and transfer of actual business data – this is still accomplished by your existing storage hardware and software which is replicating the actual data to the offsite backup center (in real time for the best security), and works in conjunction with VMware’s ‘Site Recovery Manager’ to ensure computing resources are available as close to 100% of the time as possible, so when a failure occurs, a switchover to the backup is virtually immediate.

Add to that VMware's consumer line. The new flagship product is VMware Fusion for Mac OS X, allowing virtualization of almost any operating system you want on top of Mac OS X. This sits alongside VMware’s Workstation software for PCs which can also run multiple operating systems such as older versions of Windows or different versions of Linux, but sadly, not Mac OS X, which is an Apple limitation, and you have a complete suite of virtualization products for business and consumers which let us take advantage of being able to run multiple virtual machines at the same time on the same computer.

My experiences so far with VMware Fusion for Mac OS X have been eye-opening. Not only is the entire process very smooth, and very Mac-like, but the ability to run Windows and Mac programs side-by-side, or to also run Linux programs at the same time, is very seductive. Yes, there is competition in Parallels Desktop 3.0, but after reading many reviews and reports over the past few months of new versions and/or beta releases from both sides, I decided to get a MacBook Pro and try VMware Fusion first.

So far, it’s very impressive, so much so that you have to ask yourself, as a consumer, why you’d buy a PC at all, when you can have a Mac and a PC instead? Granted, there are some excellent high-end media center 'desktop replacement' notebooks from all the PC notebook vendors, with the ever improving Tablet PC another reason to go for a PC - but a Mac with virtualization software added (on top of Apple's own free 'Boot Camp' software allowing Macs to run Windows XP or Vista natively with the Mac OS switched off) finally eliminates the compatibility issues as you can just run the software you need and it will work, aside from most Direct-X 9 or 10 games when running Windows virtually - you'll need to run in natively for that.

Virtualization is such a hot area that Microsoft is rushing to complete work on their own virtualization products, but they are at least 18 months behind, if not, in reality, much further back. XenSource is, according to reports, making good progress and are set, in the not-too-distant future, to release a competitor to VMware’s ESX 3i.

All of this activity is good – it keeps VMware on their toes, fighting hard to deliver new features and better solutions first, as both Microsoft and Citrix, XenSource’s new parent company, work hard to try and trump VMware at their own game.

There’s also the people at Parallels who have had good success in the Mac virtualization arena. They’re now moving into virtualizing servers as well, and will provide even more competition into a dynamic industry.

VMware have been doubling their growth every year, and the announcements they made at VMworld 2007 are likely to ensure that this financial year is even stronger than the years before it. Massive growth can’t continue forever, but there’s plenty of lifespan left in the virtualization industry yet.

Businesses are heartily embracing the concept of virtualization and are putting into practice in their businesses, whichever virtualization platform they are using. Now consumers have begun to see the benefits of virtualization too – perhaps in the not too distant future, having one PC that comes pre-loaded with a range of operating systems and virtualization software as standard will be the normal order of things.

Until then, the opportunities and benefits afforded by virtualization technology are available to anyone that wants them. If you’ve got a PC and want to try it out for yourself, have a look at VMware Player - it’s free to download and use.

If you’re an Intel Mac user, you probably already known all about Parallels and VMware Fusion to run Windows XP or Vista on your Mac (or in Fusion's case, Linux and other operating systems too) - both around US $80, while another free program to run virtual machines on your PC comes from Microsoft with the free Virtual PC 2007. A reader has noted in the comments below a package I'd read about but haven't tried yet - VirtualBox , which has also had good reports online - thanks for the reminder, it's going on the list to try with Parallels too, to see how they're doing things differently and how good their implementation is!

So… if you have heard of virtualization but haven’t yet tried it, there are a range of free and paid options to give it a go. It’s the wave of the future, letting you get more out of your computer(s) than ever before, whether you’re a multinational corporation or a single person; whether you run PCs, Macs or mainframes.

It’s hard to imagine that something virtual could be better than something real, and I’m a happy convert, looking to see how else I can use virtualization myself or introduce it to friends. Virtual can be much better than real in certain circumstances, and this is one of them. But don’t take my word for it - find out for yourself and you’ll see what I mean!

Alex travelled to VMworld 2007 as a guest of VMware.