Hyper-V or VSphere 5.5

We are new to virtualization. We are trying to decide if we should go with Hyper-V or VSphere 5.5. Does anyone have experience with the two or can anyone offer any advice?

We are hoping to make the right decision and move forward immediately. Cost is not a factor in our comparison.

Thank You

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cyberguypr

This can't be answered without context. What is driving this? What's the environment like? What features are required? I could go on and on but short story is any intelligent recommendation needs lots of background on what problem you are trying to solve.

Verities

Riding on Cyberguy's coat tails....is cost your most important factor? Also, there is a ton of information on Google regarding the comparisons technically speaking (here are just two...one from Microsoft and one from VMware):

VMware or Microsoft? Comparing vSphere 5.5 and Windows Server 2012 R2 Hyper-V At-A-Glance - KeithMayer.com - Site Home - TechNet Blogs

VMware Hypervisor: Comparison with Microsoft Hyper-V and Citrix Xen Server | United States

I work with VMware vSphere Suite daily and think its an outstanding product. They are years ahead of almost every other vendor in the virtualization arena. Its a stable product, with a ton of features, its easy to learn, but it costs a lot of money.

JeanM

What these guys said. If it's for lab, try both and make the right decision based on your particular needs.

I tried both and went with ESXi.

ccnpninja

As a network guy, I recommend vSphere. Cisco is doing strong business with Vmware. They have SRE modules that are pre-shipped with Vmware stuff.

jibbajabba

"Move forward immediately" is a recipe for disaster. Virtualizing your environment requires planning and testing.

There are decision to be made on more than just the hypervisor. Storage - will this be physical or virtual ?
Network - same, physical or virtual ?
Do you start from scratch, or are you trying to re-use any old hardware?
Is the hardware on the HCL of either venor's website ?
What features do you require and why do you want to virtualize ?
Did a specific feature made you decide ? Underutlization / waste of resources ?
Is your software certified for virtulization ? Are there any restrictions ?
Do you have the resources in house to support either decision (VMware vs. Microsoft knowledge) ?

When virtulizing, you eventually reach a point of no return so you need to plan this properly beforehand rather than rush into this (and pay twice).

dave330i

If cost isn't a factor go with vSphere.

kj0

dave330i wrote: »

If cost isn't a factor go with vSphere.

I would like to say "That's what an employee would say" but I also would agree. better functionality and overall better product, but for free, Hyper-V does cover it.

dave330i

kj0 wrote: »

I would like to say "That's what an employee would say" but I also would agree. better functionality and overall better product, but for free, Hyper-V does cover it.

Only their hypervisior is free. If you throw in their management software & OPEX, the price difference between the 2 solution isn't that big.

Verities

dave330i wrote: »

Only their hypervisior is free. If you throw in their management software & OPEX, the price difference between the 2 solution isn't that big.

What about SQL server licensing? That's a huge benefit with Hyper-V and can save a lot of money. We use vSphere in our environment but are currently doing a SQL server enterprise consolidation because the licensing fees are off the charts.

TheProf

Verities wrote: »

What about SQL server licensing? That's a huge benefit with Hyper-V and can save a lot of money. We use vSphere in our environment but are currently doing a SQL server enterprise consolidation because the licensing fees are off the charts.

You can always go with the appliance and save the money on the SQL + Windows licensing.

Both hypervisors are good these days. It really depends on your requirements, both business and technical.

netsysllc

If you are a Microsoft shop stick with Hyper-v it will be easier and a more familiar environment. Plus if you add system center down the road it will add many Microsoft centric services to your network.

patman

For OP, If cost isn't a factor then I'd recommend going with BOTH. Actually, We have VMWare, Hyper-V, and KVM running because each fits in it's own way to get the job done and interestingly, the solutions tend to be the the least costly and most effective in the long run.

Verities

TheProf wrote: »

You can always go with the appliance and save the money on the SQL + Windows licensing.

Both hypervisors are good these days. It really depends on your requirements, both business and technical.

But again, OP needs to be aware of the limitations, configuration differences, and database compatibility, that the vCenter Server Appliance has vs vCenter Server.

scott28tt

Time to build a lab, and evaluate both - ease of day to day administration, performance, monitoring, and automation, being mindful of what you're trying to achieve...

TheProf

Verities wrote: »

But again, OP needs to be aware of the limitations, configuration differences, and database compatibility, that the vCenter Server Appliance has vs vCenter Server.

Agreed!

TheProf

Maybe 6.5 will make a come back

Zartanasaurus

If cost isn't a factor, you need to look at what features each brings to the table and decide if there are any that you can't live without. In technology there's always lots of cool features that you never really end up using.

iBrokeIT

Based on the complete lack of criteria that you offered other than "cost is not an issue", I would say go with vSphere 5.5 because it is a more mature platform than Hyper-V.

TheProf

TheProf wrote: »

Maybe 6.5 will make a come back

It's not a bad hypervisor, we've used it in the past to deploy XenDesktop to save some money. But it does not really compete with Hyper-V or vSphere... it does not have the density that the other hypervisors have.. but they're starting to make some changes in 6.5 so who knows where it will be.. with the Sanbolic acquisition, things might change for Citrix in the hypervisor market.

jibbajabba

phoeneous wrote: »

I've been running 6.2 rock solid since it's been released. Dell r710, 64gb ram, internal storage, 12 vms, no issues at all.

No offence, but probably not comparable with a big production environment

Dakinggamer87

As others have mentioned you need to consider quite a few factors but my personal recommendation is vSphere over Hyper-V. I have used Citrix, Hyper-V, and vSphere and find vSphere to be the best of the three.

It's very powerful, dynamic, and easy to learn but with tons of features and complexity to scale large enterprise needs.

Deathmage

Hyper-V: the hypervisor resides inside of Windows Server O/S, has some pretty kool features, but no intuitive pane of glass per-say for Managment, VM escape is 100% a possibility and a security concern. The only plus side I can tell is that Hyper-V is included with a Standard and above Server O/S's license so no need to invest in licensing, so it's free.

VMware: hypervisor is built upon itself, no VM escape possible or very minimal risk of it. Better management of resources, way more productivity features, more stable. Very easy to use Management pane with vCenter. Costs a boatload.

TheProf

Deathmage wrote: »

Hyper-V: the hypervisor resides inside of Windows Server O/S, has some pretty kool features, but no intuitive pane of glass per-say for Managment, VM escape is 100% a possibility and a security concern. The only plus side I can tell is that Hyper-V is included with a Standard and above Server O/S's license so no need to invest in licensing, so it's free.

VMware: hypervisor is built upon itself, no VM escape possible or very minimal risk of it. Better management of resources, way more productivity features, more stable. Very easy to use Management pane with vCenter. Costs a boatload.

I am a VMware guy all the way, but I do have to admit, Hyper-V has come a long way! For much better security, you can run Hyper-V on a Windows Core edition which eliminates a lot of the vulnerabilities plus the generic windows crashes like explorer faults. Another nice aspect to Hyper-V is that it is compatible with more hardware, just like you mention, it runs inside an OS.

Hyper-V also has a management solution called SCVMM, similar to vCenter. The most important part to consider, is that both products have their strengths, but each product will be managed differently.. After all, one is based on the linux/unix kernel, the other is Windows

thenjduke

phoeneous wrote: »

No offence taken, care to elaborate?

I would like the elaboration too and no offense taken

I have used both HyperV and VMWare in Production ENV. They both have their benefits and downfalls. I will tell you vmware has alot more stablization then HyperV. I seen HyperV Host get stuck in Microsoft Failover Clustering hell and the VM never come up because not sure where to start. That was in Windows 2008 R2 and I hear 2012 is better to handle those problems now.

joelsfood

phoeneous wrote: »

No offence taken, care to elaborate?

I suspect he's referring to the fact that a single host (local storage?) 12 VMs, no redundancy, doesn't exactly have the same requirements, stress or load that a large production Vmware environment might be under, so that stability in one doesn't necessarily equate to stability in the other. IE, a hypervisor might be fine in the first situation, but that might not translate into an environment that required a 10 node cluster, hundreds of VMs, a mix of iSCSI and FC storage, etc.

On the original question, Vsphere if you can afford it.