Archive for the ‘kvm’ category

Enterprise-Grade Virtualization Management Now Available

July 29th, 2010

(The Hosting News) – Managing open source hypervisors, including Xen and KVM, became a lot easier today with the release of ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise edition from Convirture Corp.

The open source version of ConVirt has been available for more than three years and is broadly deployed and well-tested in real-world data centers — having been downloaded more than 30,000 times. In fact, ConVirt1.x is included in most major Linux distributions such as Ubuntu, Open SUSE, Debian and others.

ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise extends ConVirt Open Source with the advanced automation and scalability features necessary for running large-scale or mission-critical virtualized environments. By delivering high availability, backup and recovery, storage and network automation, and enterprise-grade security, ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise enables IT managers to meet and exceed service levels while using infrastructure in the most efficient way.

ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise is also the go-to tool for enterprises ready to move beyond virtualized infrastructure management towards a hosted or private cloud model. With an extensive cloud management feature set, which includes multi-tenant security, delegated control, scheduled provisioning, resource limiting, and many more, ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise enables IT organizations to offer infrastructure-as-a-service, while ensuring full isolation and compliance with corporate policies.

“We’ve implemented a variety of virtualization platforms over the years and managing them all – especially the open source hypervisors – has always been the single biggest pain point,” said Steven Scoleri, Principal Architect at GSI Commerce, a leading provider of e-commerce and interactive marketing services. “Our beta test of ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise has gone very well and we think it just may be the game-changer we’ve been looking for. We no longer need experts on hand at all times to complete simple virtualization tasks. We look forward to further exploring ConVirt’s capabilities and using it to manage our entire open source-based virtual data center.”

“Until now, any organization that wanted a complete solution for managing and automating a virtual data center was locked into expensive and proprietary solutions like VMware vCenter,”,” said Arsalan Farooq, CEO of Convirture. “That changes today as ConVirt 2.0’s advanced automation, private cloud management, enterprise scalability and datacenter integration features now meet or exceed what’s available from proprietary platform vendors. With ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise, organizations considering Xen or KVM as open source alternatives to commercial virtualization platforms are no longer forced to compromise on manageability.”

About ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise
ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise supports all of the features available with the ConVirt 2.0 Open Source product including:
- Server pool-based management
- Templates-based provisioning
- Monitoring and configuration management
- Comprehensive virtual machine administration
- Highly scalable, 3-tier, standards-based architecture

In addition, ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise delivers scalability, automation, and private cloud management features that were previously available only for proprietary virtualization platforms, including:

- High availability: ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise ensures that mission-critical applications are always up and running by delivering a comprehensive high availability feature set, including virtual and physical machine failover;

- Backup and recovery: A full backup and recovery feature set ensures successful recovery from planned and unplanned outages. Scheduled and on-demand backups are supported. Restore modes can be for the most recent state or any earlier backup. Both virtual machine state and storage are captured, so virtual machines are brought up in a consistent state.

- Private Cloud Management: A data center that has been virtualized can be turned into a private, infrastructure-as-a-service cloud in a scalable and secure way, with support for full multi-tenant security, delegated control, scheduled provisioning, resource limiting and the ability to create virtual appliances that comply with corporate standards and publish them effortlessly to cloud users.

- Storage and network automation with ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise significantly streamlines the error-prone and time-consuming tasks of configuring network and storage in a virtualized environment. Storage configuration standardizes storage across a server pool by automating configuration of all storage types, including NFS, iSCSi, AOE, Fiber Channel and LVM. Network integration provides a centralized interface for managing virtual networks.

- Enterprise Integration: ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise provides a full suite of integration capabilities, including an open repository, command line interface, and programmatic APIs.

Pricing and Availability
ConVirt 2.0 Enterprise is available immediately direct from Convirture. Pricing starts at $1,495 per host for up to 10 hosts, with volume pricing available for larger environments. A “per virtual machine” pricing package is also available for ISP’s and hosting providers. More information is available at www.convirture.com/contact.html.

About Convirture
Convirture was founded in 2006 to help organizations effectively manage open source virtualization platforms. More information is available at www.convirture.com.

Enterprise-Grade Virtualization Management Now Available

The Planet Launches New Server Cloud

June 28th, 2010

(The Hosting News) – The Planet, the global hosting leader, today introduced its new Server Cloud, leveraging the power of virtualization and backed by a rich technology platform. With fast and easy provisioning, Server Cloud combines the simplicity and security of dedicated servers with the elasticity of a cloud platform. The initial offering is designed expressly for hosting companies with critical web assets and applications, and hosting resellers looking to complement their dedicated server profile. The production-ready Server Cloud instances provide completely automated provisioning, with login in as little as five minutes. The Planet also provides its highly regarded around-the-clock service to support the Server Cloud offering.
The new Server Cloud provides the consistent high-performance and dedicated resources missing in other virtual server offerings, backed by its powerful infrastructure: Sun Storage Area Networks, Intel Nehalem processors, a Cisco- and Juniper-powered network, and Dell servers.
Using KVM – Kernel-based Virtual Machine – for virtualization, the recommended platform from The Linux Foundation, customers gain access to next-generation cloud capabilities. KVM is rapidly becoming the open-source community standard for virtualization and the agreed-upon platform for future development. The Planet Server Cloud uses the Canonical Ubuntu Server for its KVM platform.
“We’ve conducted extensive surveys with our customers about the features that are most important to them, and accordingly we’ve spared no expense in developing a platform that’s purpose-built for web-based businesses,” said Carl Meadows, senior product manager for Cloud Services with The Planet. “The industry is rife with cloud services hindered by inconsistency and a lack of redundancy. By contrast, our customers count on us for high availability, rapid provisioning, seamless scalability and generous bandwidth, which they’ll find in our new Server Cloud. Customers are able to fully manage all aspects of their virtual servers, as well as include managed services for the platform, which provides the best value in the business.”
“We have a broad range of customers from vastly different industries who count on us to deliver the finest quality content management systems and applications for their websites,” said Wes Byrd, CIO with Dynapp, Inc. (http://www.dynapp.com). “The Planet Server Cloud provides us with the highly available and scalable environment we require to respond to the expanding demands of our customers who want a cloud option.”
“As The Planet comes to market with its new Server Cloud, they are offering their customers very transparent information on the architecture and performance of the platform, with a clear understanding of the SLAs for cloud services,” said Michelle Bailey, IDC Vice President of Enterprise Platforms and Datacenter Trends. “Cloud products continue to proliferate in the market, and customers will look for this clarity to evaluate and compare offerings so they choose the right supplier for their business requirements.”

About The Planet Server Cloud
The Planet Server Cloud provides a broad range of features for customers looking to expand their hosting profile:
Dedicated Resources: All resources for The Planet Server Cloud are 100% guaranteed. Customers receive completely dedicated CPU, RAM, storage and network capacity, which ensures performance isn’t negatively affected by another customer’s usage.

Sun SAN Backend: The Planet Server Cloud is powered by a high-performance, high-availability Sun Storage Area Network (SAN). Many cloud solutions operate on local disks from the host server, leaving customers vulnerable to hardware failures that can result in down time and even data loss. Server Cloud is always available, since computing and storage resources are separate and independent. In the event of a complete host server failure, data is always protected.

Seamless, Rapid CPU, RAM Upgrades: Customers buy only what they require to get started and grow their performance seamlessly as demand expands. A single system reboot from the server host recognizes any added resources.

Enterprise-Grade Infrastructure: The Planet Server Cloud is powered by the latest technologies. From the Sun Microsystems SAN, to network gear supplied by Juniper and Cisco, and Dell servers equipped with Intel’s fast Nehalem processors, the company has developed this robust platform to be resilient under the most difficult loads.

Operating System Support: Customers can select operating system support from both Linux and Windows platforms, including Windows Server 2008 R2.

Managed Services: The Planet offers a full array of service upgrades, including managed server monitoring and remediation, server security management and managed backup.

Next-Generation Virtualization: The Planet built its Server Cloud on the Linux Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) Hypervisor, the primary platform supported by both The Linux Foundation and the top Linux distributions, including Canonical’s Ubuntu and Red Hat. KVM supports the latest virtualization technologies, including live migration, RAM de-duplication, para-virtualized storage and network capabilities, which combine stellar performance and efficiency. While other offerings require operating system (OS) modifications, KVM does not. Customers run unaltered/native versions of their chosen OS without any requirement for development modifications. As a result, they benefit from better security since new patches and updates are immediately available without the requirement for load development intervention.

To learn more about The Planet’s Server Cloud, visit the Web site at http://www.theplanet.com/cloud-hosting/server-cloud.aspx.

About The Planet
The Planet is the leading provider of On Demand IT Infrastructure solutions, hosting more than 18,000 small- and medium-size businesses and 12 million Web sites worldwide. Customers have the power to choose from the broadest range of hosting solutions in the industry, from dedicated servers, Managed Dedicated Servers, Managed Hosting and data center colocation, all backed by 24×7x365 support. With the best choice of servers, software tools and world-class service, backed by state-of-the-art data centers and an enterprise-class network, The Planet turns IT into a powerful competitive advantage that enables customers to grow their businesses. For additional information, visit http://www.theplanet.com.

The Planet Launches New Server Cloud