{"id":4583,"date":"2007-04-12T10:09:00","date_gmt":"2007-04-12T10:09:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.technet.microsoft.com\/windowsserver\/2007\/04\/12\/viridian-and-virtual-server-timing-updates\/"},"modified":"2021-09-24T16:32:52","modified_gmt":"2021-09-24T23:32:52","slug":"viridian-and-virtual-server-timing-updates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/windows-server\/blog\/2007\/04\/12\/viridian-and-virtual-server-timing-updates\/","title":{"rendered":"Viridian and Virtual Server Timing Updates"},"content":{"rendered":"
As the person who oversees the development plans, teams and strategy for Microsoft\u2019s virtualization software on desktops and servers, I want to update everyone on the timing of our server virtualization offerings. I know that many of our customers and partners will hear of these changes from their usual Microsoft contacts, but I wanted to personally explain some of the reasons behind the new schedule for Windows Server virtualization (codename Viridian) and Virtual Server 2005 R2 service pack 1. But first, here\u2019s where we stand today:<\/p>\n
The public beta of Windows Server virtualization will ship in the second half of 2007, not in the first half as previously disclosed.<\/p>\n
The final version of Virtual Server 2005 R2 service pack 1<\/a> now will be available in Q2, not Q1 as previously stated. In the interim, customers and partners can download a Release Candidate (RC) version later this month – this is code complete and an update to the current beta 2.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Up front, it\u2019s important to know that Windows Server \u201cLonghorn\u201d remains on schedule for beta 3 will be this half and RTM in the second half. Iain McDonald and team are doing a great job delivering the next-generation Windows Server OS, which includes in-demand features like TS Gateway, Server Core, Network Access Protection, IIS 7.0, new server manager and failover clustering improvements \u2026 to name a few. All the work being done here is designed to deliver a safer, more secure infrastructure and simplify admin tasks. This work will help make customers\u2019 experiences with Windows Server virtualization even better.<\/p>\n
So, you ask, why the schedule change to the beta of Windows Server virtualization? The primary drivers are around meeting our internal goals for performance and scalability. \u00a0In an IT environment of ever-growing multi-core processor systems, Windows Server virtualization is being designed to scale across a much broader range of systems than the competition.\u00a0 We\u2019re designing Windows Server virtualization to scale up to 64 processors, which I\u2019m proud to say is something no other vendor\u2019s product supports.\u00a0 We are also providing a much more dynamic VM environment with hot-add of processors, memory, disk and networking as well a greater scalability with more SMP support and memory. We still have some work to do to have the beta meet the \u201cscale up\u201d bar we have set. Also, we\u2019re tuning Windows Server virtualization to run demanding enterprise IT workloads, even I\/O intensive workloads, so performance is very important and we still have some work to do here.<\/p>\n
As pointed out\u00a0earlier<\/a>, select partners have been testing a private beta version of Windows Server virtualization since December. We\u2019ll continue to rely on partner input as we reach the beta milestone. And as the public beta for Windows Server virtualization nears, we\u2019ll provide guidance on how to add Windows Server virtualization to your systems running Windows Server \u201cLonghorn.\u201d Windows Server virtualization remains on schedule – to be released within 180 days of the release of “Longhorn.”<\/p>\n
Today we\u2019re also updating the delivery schedule for the service pack of Virtual Server 2005 R2. It\u2019ll be available later this quarter. \u00a0In this instance, we required some additional time to test the new operating systems that will be supported with the service pack of Virtual Server R2. We\u2019ve added support for three additional operating systems \u2013 SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10, Solaris 10 and the recent CTP build of Windows Server \u201cLonghorn.\u201d \u00a0An interesting point here — in less than one year we\u2019ve seen more than 15,000 downloads of the Linux add-ins for Virtual Server 2005 R2<\/a>, which indicates strong interest to consolidate Linux workloads on Windows Server.<\/p>\n
We\u2019ve made numerous enhancements with Virtual Server R2 SP1 that allow it to scale (64 VMs on 32-bit Windows Server hosts; 512 VMs on x64 Windows Server hosts) on systems with more memory (up to 256 GB) and more cores.\u00a0 And we\u2019ve added support for hardware assisted virtualization in the form of Intel VT and AMD-V.\u00a0 The team is also very proud of their delivery of Virtual PC 2007 and the tremendous interest in the product, with over one million downloads in the first 38 days.<\/p>\n
I remain confident that Microsoft\u2019s strategy and areas of investments<\/a> will help customers\u2019 IT systems become more dynamic and self-managing. I\u2019ll talk more about these areas on May 2 during a keynote address at the Server Blades Summit 2007<\/a> in Anaheim. I hope to see you there.<\/p>\n
Mike Neil
\ngeneral manager, virtualization strategy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the person who oversees the development plans, teams and strategy for Microsoft\u2019s virtualization software on desktops and servers, I want to update everyone on the timing of our server virtualization offerings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":685,"featured_media":20671,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"msxcm_post_with_no_image":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","_classifai_text_to_speech_error":"","footnotes":""},"post_tag":[8,14,23],"product":[],"content-type":[],"solution":[],"coauthors":[926],"class_list":["post-4583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-longhorn","tag-virtualization","tag-windows-server","review-flag-1593580427-982","review-flag-1-1593580431-223","review-flag-2-1593580436-936","review-flag-3-1593580441-66","review-flag-7-1593580462-674","review-flag-new-1593580246-692","review-flag-partn-1593580283-870","review-flag-vm-1593580805-84"],"yoast_head":"\n
Viridian and Virtual Server Timing Updates | Microsoft Windows Server Blog<\/title>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\n\t\n\t\n