Client Hyper-V

[pingjockey]

I have been considering moving from VMware workstation to Client Hyper-V due to the price and that I mostly use Microsoft vm's. Is there any sort of performance impact on the host when client Hyper-V is installed? Obviously I would expect there to be some performance hits when the guest is running but when there isn't a guest running will there be a noticeable issues?

Thanks

 

[Hagrid]

The only thing I noticed was that I liked workstation better then hyper-v.
Workstation just seems to run the VM faster, its easier to setup/change, or maybe I am just use to workstation...

 

[pingjockey]

From the reports I have read client hyper-v had better disk performance and the fact it uses vhdx makes it a better choice for moving data. I liked workstation but the upgrade price is sort of high for what I am trying to do.

 

[RADRaze2KX]

From the reports I have read client hyper-v had better disk performance and the fact it uses vhdx makes it a better choice for moving data. I liked workstation but the upgrade price is sort of high for what I am trying to do.

From what I saw, Hyper-V benchmarked with better disk performance, but real world usage placed it behind VMWare in terms of application launching.

 

[PGHammer]

From what I saw, Hyper-V benchmarked with better disk performance, but real world usage placed it behind VMWare in terms of application launching.

What really bothers ME about vmWare is that using any single product from them (even the free products) basically ties you down to the entire vmWare infrastructure, which gets pricey - especially in terms of server-based virtualization. However, there ARE some areas where vmWare makes more sense compared to Hyper-V; overall, it's basically a wash for identically-supported clients (Windows clients).

Yes; vmWare offers more freedom in terms of client support - however, there's a price you pay for it (primarily in terms of costs over and above client-OS licensing). With Hyper-V, other than the cost of client licenses, there ARE no other costs. Even more problematical (for vmWare), Hyper-V is getting easier to adopt AND to use. So the issue becomes (where client support is equal) is the price of vmWare worth it.

 

[-Dragon-]

A quick search for Hyper-V 2012 vs vSphere 5.1 for any sort of performance review didn't really turn up anything but I'm not so sure the performance difference is that great between them to really matter, they're both pretty close to bare metal these days for most of what counts. If you're talking for home use then if your system specs are within VMware's free hypervisor's limits then you're probably fine either way, if you want your home server to have specs outside what the free VMware host allows, hyper-v's the obviously better choice.

 

[dbwillis]

Isnt Client Hyper-V different than Server Hyper-V ?

 

[-Dragon-]

Assuming he's talking the hyper-v in win8, no not really, can't do live migrations and can't replicate and I don't think SR-IOV works, nor does clustering, but doesn't sound like he needs any of that

 

[bAMtan2]

I mostly use Microsoft vm's.

these hypervisors don't have obvious performance differences in a workstation context. what matters is that you said "mostly" microsoft vms. mostly might not be good enough. microsoft will never support non-windows well. you can get away with a couple linux distros in hyperv if you're lucky... at least until the support goes dry, and the next release of them doesnt work right.

if you use only microsoft windows, use hyperv. but if you're not only microsoft...

 

[-Dragon-]

MS released open source hyper-v kernel drivers a while ago now, Linux runs great under hyper-v now

 

[4saken]

MS released open source hyper-v kernel drivers a while ago now, Linux runs great under hyper-v now

yup, this. No longer a major concern.

 

[Mackintire]

I have been considering moving from VMware workstation to Client Hyper-V due to the price and that I mostly use Microsoft vm's. Is there any sort of performance impact on the host when client Hyper-V is installed? Obviously I would expect there to be some performance hits when the guest is running but when there isn't a guest running will there be a noticeable issues?

Thanks

Almost none when the processor supports VT-d extensions. (which includes almost all modern midline or higher processors)

As for your second comment, yes obviously as you are running (2) machines on a single box.

 

[pingjockey]

Almost none when the processor supports VT-d extensions. (which includes almost all modern midline or higher processors)

As for your second comment, yes obviously as you are running (2) machines on a single box.

Ok, so the parent partition will be treated differently by the Hypervisor, got it. I mostly run a few windows server virtual machines for testing purposes. I will have a few Linux machines as well but I feel comfortable that the guest should perform fine.

I won't be using any of the guests to game with or expect to have USB or sound supported and mostly do everything via RDP. My only concern were the reports I have read about the parent partition being performance being impacted.

 

[pjkenned]

these hypervisors don't have obvious performance differences in a workstation context. what matters is that you said "mostly" microsoft vms. mostly might not be good enough. microsoft will never support non-windows well. you can get away with a couple linux distros in hyperv if you're lucky... at least until the support goes dry, and the next release of them doesnt work right.

if you use only microsoft windows, use hyperv. but if you're not only microsoft...

Ubuntu Workstation and Server have Hyper-V Integration components in the base iso. Ubuntu on Windows 8 Hyper-V is a very quick installation. CentOS on Windows 8 Hyper-V is slightly more difficult. But both can be done in a few minutes and you can follow the linked guides for a step-by-step.

One big thing you don't get with Linux VMs is dynamic memory allocation. In mobile applications such as when using a Surface Pro with 4GB of RAM, that does limit you a bit (obviously.) Still very easy to setup Windows and popular Linux variants at this point. Especially if you just need to spin up quick VMs for development or whatever.

 

[pingjockey]

Ubuntu Workstation and Server have Hyper-V Integration components in the base iso. Ubuntu on Windows 8 Hyper-V is a very quick installation. CentOS on Windows 8 Hyper-V is slightly more difficult. But both can be done in a few minutes and you can follow the linked guides for a step-by-step.

One big thing you don't get with Linux VMs is dynamic memory allocation. In mobile applications such as when using a Surface Pro with 4GB of RAM, that does limit you a bit (obviously.) Still very easy to setup Windows and popular Linux variants at this point. Especially if you just need to spin up quick VMs for development or whatever.

I can live without dynamic ram on a Linux VM as I don't really need them all the time. Really my concern is how will using client hyper-v affect the parent partition's performance when it comes to say gaming and such. I obviously won't have the guests running when I fire up a game but I was just concerned about what effect if any would the hypervisor have on the parent partition.

 

[Wrench00]

What really bothers ME about vmWare is that using any single product from them (even the free products) basically ties you down to the entire vmWare infrastructure, which gets pricey - especially in terms of server-based virtualization. However, there ARE some areas where vmWare makes more sense compared to Hyper-V; overall, it's basically a wash for identically-supported clients (Windows clients).

Yes; vmWare offers more freedom in terms of client support - however, there's a price you pay for it (primarily in terms of costs over and above client-OS licensing). With Hyper-V, other than the cost of client licenses, there ARE no other costs. Even more problematical (for vmWare), Hyper-V is getting easier to adopt AND to use. So the issue becomes (where client support is equal) is the price of vmWare worth it.

1. VMware.

Hyper V only advantage is cost. Its not better then VMware. When you start playing with enterprise class features HyperV is still very long ways behind. If your MS shop thats fine, even the occasional Linux vm is fine. Try running, Solaris, BSD, SCO, legacy software even such as MS you still have issues.

If your talking about vendor lockin then your fucked either way you go there is no open starndard for VMs. If you go VMware then you got vmware lockin, same applies for HyperV, XEN. KVM, etc.. I am not sure what your point is.

 

[pingjockey]

So I have installed Client Hyper-v and things seem to be running ok for me. Parent partition seems to be running fine and the guests as well. I did notice that the speedstep and power saving features are not working correctly though. When I fire up task manager the CPU never seems to clock down at all. I am going to assume that the hypervisor is handling that now though. Other than that it seems to working fine.

 

[mstavridis]

I run multiple Hyper-v Server for multiple clients. VMware falls on its face when compared to the business value of running windows server on hyper-v.

FYI I have never had any performance running any flavor of unix on hyper-v

I use to be a VMware fanboy, but you can't argue with real world examples.

 

[Wrench00]

I run multiple Hyper-v Server for multiple clients. VMware falls on its face when compared to the business value of running windows server on hyper-v.

FYI I have never had any performance running any flavor of unix on hyper-v

I use to be a VMware fanboy, but you can't argue with real world examples.

Really since when has HyperV Ever supported UNIX? Linux yes Unix not so much, not officially.

I admit HyperV 2012 is much better then the pos 2008 was. It sure wins on the lower cost end.
If you running mission critical apps that are non windows workloads then you would be better off doing it with VMWare.

HyperV has had many great strides since 2008 its still missing some features that are in VMWare used by lots of Enterprises.
Autodepoly, FT, DRS etc..

Use the tool that's right for the job.
MS is now caught up with VMWare but VMWare is also passed the simple point of Virtualization of workloads they are now doing virtualization of Data-centers. Coolest I have seen was virtualization of Android phones.
I welcome the competition because its good for the customer and my pocket.

I also think that VMWare and MS will get their ass kicked by Openstack and KVM in the long run.

 

[pingjockey]

But a number of those features are supported already in SCCM 2012 like autodeploy and such which most shops running hyper-v will have in place. SCCM is the glue that will bring feature parity to the management of hyper-v 2012.

 

[Wrench00]

But a number of those features are supported already in SCCM 2012 like autodeploy and such which most shops running hyper-v will have in place. SCCM is the glue that will bring feature parity to the management of hyper-v 2012.

Actually there is no Autodeploy. Its still WDS trickery.
FT is still missing
DRS is still missing
Distributed switch is almost as good except if you load third party switch.

and SCCM is not free by any means.

 

[Child of Wonder]

Actually there is no Autodeploy. Its still WDS trickery.
FT is still missing
DRS is still missing
Distributed switch is almost as good except if you load third party switch.

and SCCM is not free by any means.

Hyper-V has DRS. It's called Dynamic Optimization. Doesn't work on the storage side though, just CPU and RAM.

 

[Wrench00]

Hyper-V has DRS. It's called Dynamic Optimization. Doesn't work on the storage side though, just CPU and RAM.

So what your saying DRS is not fully implemented. So technically its not a feature is it.

 

[Child of Wonder]

So what your saying DRS is not fully implemented. So technically its not a feature is it.

DRS is referred to in two ways in VMware: DRS and Storage DRS. DRS is the commonly known process in which VMs are dynamically assigned and migrated based on host CPU and memory usage. Storage DRS is where virtual disks are dynamically assigned and migrated based on datastore capacity and performance. DRS is configured at the host cluster level while Storage DRS is configured at a datastore cluster level.

Hyper-V has "DRS" but not "Storage DRS."

 

[Wrench00]

DRS is referred to in two ways in VMware: DRS and Storage DRS. DRS is the commonly known process in which VMs are dynamically assigned and migrated based on host CPU and memory usage. Storage DRS is where virtual disks are dynamically assigned and migrated based on datastore capacity and performance. DRS is configured at the host cluster level while Storage DRS is configured at a datastore cluster level.

Hyper-V has "DRS" but not "Storage DRS."

My fault I refer to sDRS as DRS, my bad.

 

[PGHammer]

The only thing I noticed was that I liked workstation better then hyper-v.
Workstation just seems to run the VM faster, its easier to setup/change, or maybe I am just use to workstation...

If you are USED to VMware (Workstation or Player), migrating away from it is hard, hard, hard - however, there is an incentive other than price - surprisingly, it's if you need support for OSes that aren't OS X (the major area where VMware stomps all over all the competition) on non-Apple hardware.

I've been comparing VMware Player to Hyper-V; however, since I don't have SLAT/EPT support (which client Hyper-V on Windows 8 requires), I have to make do with Windows Server 2012 Standard (which also supports Hyper-V, but without the EPT/SLAT requirement). Hyper-V actually doesn't load up the CPU any more than VMware Player or Workstation - even at the same settings for each VM; Hyper-V also lets you get more fine-grained with VM settings by divorcing network connectivity from adapters - you can actually have a dedicated *wireless* virtual switch for VM use - you don't have to share the primary NIC, which is the default with all VM software, including Hyper-V. Because the settings are at the switch - not at the VM - you can have multiple VMs using the same switch - wired or wireless; your only issue will be bandwidth. (Yes; Windows Server 2012 does indeed support wireless adapters, and thus wireless virtual switches - so did Windows Server 2008; it's not even a new feature. However, a lot more wireless adapters are supported.) For all other VM software, network settings are configured at the VM, which can get rather nitpicky. (The ability to use wireless virtual switches means that simulating/troubleshooting portable PC issues just got a ton easier.)