Addon
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custom |
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Unique Feature 1
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Add-On not supported by this product
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Add-On not supported by this product
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Add-On not supported by this product
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General
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- Fully Supported
- Limitation
- Not Supported
- Information Only
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Pros
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- + OVM subscription includes license for Enterprise Manager
- + Use OVM to control Oracle Licenses for better TCO
- + Default choice for Oracle apps (support)
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Cons
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- - Skills - OVM not as widely known as Vmware
- - Xen Based - Market is working more toward KVM
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Content |
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THE VIRTUALISTS
Content created by THE VIRTUALISTS: http://www.thevirtualist.org/
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WhatMatrix
Content created by WhatMatrix
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Assessment |
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XenServer 6.5 is available in Standard Edition and Enterprise Edition
On 13th January 2015 Citrix released XenServer 6.5, offering a 64bit Dom0 and significant networking and disk performance increase.
In May 2015, XenServer 6.5.0 Service Pack 1 came with new features, see http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX142355
-Enhanced guest support
-Intel GVT-d Pass-through support for Windows VMs
-NVIDIA GPU Pass-through support for Linux VMs
-Ability to manage and monitor Docker™ containers using XenCenter
-Improved user experience for read caching. Customers can now see the status of read caching in XenCenter
Citrix announced in April 2013 that XenServer will be made available open source, as a Linux Foundation Collaborative Project, see http://xenserver.org/.
What is the difference between XenServer and the open-source Xen Project Hypervisor?
The Xen Project hypervisor is used by XenServer. In addition to the open-source Xen Project hypervisor, Citrix XenServer includes:
Control domain (dom0)
XenCenter - A Windows client for VM management
VM Templates for installing popular operating systems as VMs
Enterprise level support
Citrix entered the Hypervisor market with the acquisition of XenSource - the main supporter of the open source Xen project - in Oct 2007. The Xen project continues to exist, see http://www.xen.org/.
Citrix created a suite of commercial products that are named after the open source project including XenApp (aka Presentation Server), XenDesktop (Citrixs hosted virtual desktop/VDI solution) and XenServer (the only product actually based on the open source Xen hypervisor code.
XenServer uses paravirtualization and hardware-assisted virtualization, requiring either a modified guest OSs or hardware assisted CPUs (more commonly seen as its less restrictive and hardware assisted CPUs like Intel VT/AMD-V have become standard). The device drivers are provided through a Linux-based guest (CentOS) running in a control virtual machine (Dom0).
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Oracle VM 3.4 with Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control and OpenStack
Oracle VM subscriptions includes the access to the following technologies and related support:
Oracle VM 3.4 as well as previous releases and future releases
Oracle VM Server for x86 with Oracle VM Manager is a free server virtualization and management solution that makes enterprise applications easier to deploy, manage, and support. Backed worldwide by affordable enterprise-quality support for both Oracle and non-Oracle environments, Oracle VM facilitates the deployment and operation of your enterprise applications on a fully certified platform to reduce operations and support costs while simultaneously increasing IT efficiency and agility.
Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control as well as previous releases and future releases
Oracle Enterprise Manager is Oracle’s integrated enterprise IT management product line, which provides the industry’s only complete, integrated and business-driven enterprise cloud management solution. Oracle Enterprise Manager creates business value from IT by leveraging the built-in management capabilities of the Oracle stack for traditional and cloud environments, allowing customers to achieve unprecedented efficiency gains while dramatically increasing agility and service levels.
The key capabilities of Enterprise Manager includes:
- A complete cloud lifecycle management solution allowing you to quickly set up, manage and support enterprise clouds and traditional Oracle IT environments from applications to disk.
- Maximum return on IT management investment through the best solutions for intelligent management of the Oracle stack and engineered systems with real-time integration of Oracle’s knowledgebase with each customer environment
- Secure and scalable traditional and private cloud IT environments through superior, enterprise grade management
OpenStack for Oracle Linux R2 as well as previous releases and future releases (Supported as a Compute Node for Nova). Other OpenStack components are supported under the Oracle Linux subscriptions.
More Details in: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/openstack/linux/documentation/datasheet-oracle-openstack-2296038.pdf
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6.5 Release Date January 2015 (Xen - 2003, Citrix XenServer 2007, 5.6SP2 March 2011, v6: Sep 2011, 6.1: Sep 2012, 6.2 June 2013)
Xen first public release was in 2003, became part of the Novell SUSE 10 OS in 2005 (later also Red hat). In Oct 2007 Citrix acquired XenSource (the main maintainer of the Xen code) and released XenServer under the Citrix brand. Version 5.6 was released 05/2010, 5.6 SP2 released May 2011, XenServer 6 in Sep 2011 and XenServer 6.1 in Sep 2012, XenServer 6.2 in June 2013.
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Current Stable Release OVM 3.4: March 26 2016 - Initial Release Date - July 31st of 2008
The Oracle VM bundle exists since 2008 but its components already exists for more than a Decade:
- Xen Hypervisor: Initial Release in 2003
- Linux: Initial Release in 1991
- MySQL Enterprise: Initial Release in 1995
- Weblogic: Initial Release in 1997
- OCFS2: Initial Release in 2002
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Pricing |
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Open Source (free) or two commercial editions, pricing to be announced at GA: Annual: $500 / socket, Perpetual: $1250 / socket (incl. SA and support)
For commercial editions (Standard or Enterprise)XenServer is licensed on a per-CPU socket basis. For a pool to be considered licensed, all XenServer hosts in the pool must be licensed. XenServer only counts populated CPU sockets.
Customers who have purchased XenApp or XenDesktop continue to have an entitlement to XenServer.
In XenServer 6.5, customers should allocate product licenses using a Citrix License Server, as with other Citrix components. From version 6.2.0 onwards, XenServer (other than via the XenDesktop licenses) is licensed on a per-socket basis. Allocation of licenses is managed centrally and enforced by a standalone Citrix License Server, physical or virtual, in the environment. After applying a per-socket license, XenServer will display as Citrix XenServer Per-Socket Edition.
For more info: http://bit.ly/1MuvfLO
Pricing:
Annual - $500 per socket (License and Software Maintenance: SA and support)
Perpetual - $1250 per socket (License and Software Maintenance: SA and support)
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Oracle VM Premier Limited for 2 Sockets Servers 1 Yr - $599.00; Oracle VM Premier for more than 2 Sockets Servers 1 Yr - $1,199.00;
This subscription includes 24x7 support for the Oracle VM Servers, Oracle VM Manager, Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control and for being a Compute Node managed by Oracle OpenStack for Oracle Linux R2. Price List: http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/pricing/els-pricelist-070592.pdf.
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Free (XenCenter)
Citrix XenCenter is the Windows-native graphical user interface for managing Citrix XenServer. It is included for no additional cost (open source as well as commercial versions).
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$0.00
Support for Oracle VM Servers, Oracle VM Manager and Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control and for being a Compute Node managed by Oracle OpenStack for Oracle Linux R2 are included by default on Oracle VM Subscriptions.
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Bundle/Kit Pricing
Details
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No
no bundles or kits are documented
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$0.00
Support for Oracle VM Servers, Oracle VM Manager and Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control and for being a Compute Node managed by Oracle OpenStack for Oracle Linux R2 are included by default on Oracle VM Subscriptions.
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Guest OS Licensing
Details
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No
A demo Linux VM is include, there are no guest OS licenses included with the XenServer license. Guest OSs need to be therefore licensed separately.
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No
Subscriptions for Oracle Linux are sold separately.
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VM Mobility and HA
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VM Mobility |
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Live Migration of VMs
Details
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Yes XenMotion (1)
XenMotion enables live migration of virtual machines across XenServer hosts without perceived downtime. XenServer supports only one migration at a time (i.e. sequential execution if multiple are started)
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Yes - Live Migration
There is also a possibility to use SSL to encryption the Live Migration. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Migration Compatibility
Details
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Yes (Heterogeneous Pools)
XenServer 5.6 introduced Heterogeneous Pools which enables live migration across different CPU types of the same vendor (requires AMD Extended Migration or Intel Flex Migration), details here: http://bit.ly/1ADu7Py.
This capability is maintained in XenServer 6.x
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Yes
On the same Cluster/Server Pool it is possible to separate the Cluster/Server Pool Members based on the CPU Family to guarantee the success of Live Migration between those Servers but there is no possibility of grouping different CPUs generations by masking out incompatible functions using CPU Masking. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes
Enabled through XenCenter
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Yes - Maintenance Mode
It is possible to execute the Maintenance Mode and It is also possible to Lock some Servers to not receive this Offload of Virtual Machines from the Server that is entering in this State. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Automated Live Migration
Details
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Yes Workload Balancing
Workload Balancing has been re-introduced within XenServer 6.5 Enterprise Edition: Workload Balancing (WLB) automates the process of moving Virtual Machines between hosts to evenly spread Network, CPU, and Disk loads to maximize throughput. WLB keeps a history of the usage of CPU, Disk, and Network for all VMs in the pool so it can predict where workloads can be best located.
XenServer v6.2.0 included additional monitoring features for customers who wish to capture performance and throughput data. Additional 3rd party products which support workload balancing functionality are available from vendors such as VMTurbo, Lanamark, CA Technologies, Goliath, and eG Innovations.
Details here: http://bit.ly/1DLF6Y9
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Yes
Oracle VM provides a DRS feature for the following constraints: (CPU-CPU, N:Network i/o) during VMs runtime and the following constraints: (CPU-CPU, N:Network i/o, MEM:Memory) during VMs startup. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes Workload Balancing
Power management is part of XenServer Workload Balancing (WLB).
Background: Power Management introduced with 5.6 was able to automatically consolidate workloads on the lowest possible number of physical servers and power off unused hosts when their capacity is not needed. Hosts would be automatically powered back on when needed.
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Yes
Oracle VM provides a DPM feature that works with IPMI and Wake Up On Lan. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Storage Migration
Details
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Yes (Storage XenMotion)
Storage XenMotion in XenServer remains unchanged from v 6.1
XenServer 6.1 introduced the long awaited (live) Storage XenMotion capability
Storage XenMotion allows storage allocation changes while VMs are running or moved from one host to another including scenarios where a) VMs are NOT located on storage shared between the hosts (shared nothing live migration) and (b) hosts are not even in the same resource pool. This enables system administrators to:
- Live migration of a VM disk across shared storage targets within a resource pool (e.g. move between LUNs when one is at capacity);
- Live migration of a VM disk from one storage type to another storage type within a resource pool (e.g. perform storage array upgrades)
- Live migration of a VM disk to or from local storage on a XenServer host within a resource pool (reduce deployment costs by using local storage)
- Rebalance or move VMs between XenServer pools (for example moving a VM from a development environment to a production environment);
Starting with XenServer 6.1, administrators initiating XenMotion and Storage XenMotion operations can specify which management interface
transfers should occur over. Through the use of multiple management interfaces, the virtual disk transfer can occur with less impact on both core XenServer operations and VM network utilization.
Citrix supports up to 3 concurrent Storage XenMotion operations. The maximum number for (non-CDROM) VDIs per VM = six. Allowed Snapshots per VM undergoing Storage XenMotion = 1.
Technical details here: http://bit.ly/1xR85sG
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Yes
Oracle VM provides a capability to Migrate the VM Disks to different Storage Repositories (Live Local Repository to Local Repository in different Hypervisors - Not Live for any other type of Storage Migration). More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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HA/DR |
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16 hosts / resource pool
16 Hosts per Resource Pool.
Please see XenServer 6.5 Configuration Limits document http://bit.ly/17eNuo7
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32 Hosts in Cluster/Pool
Oracle VM can have up to 32 Servers on each Clustered Server Pool and up to 64 Servers on each Unclustered Server Pool. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Integrated HA (Restart vm)
Details
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Yes
XenServer High Availability protects the resource pool against host failures by restarting virtual machine. HA allows for configuration of restart priority and failover capacity. Configuration of HA is simple (effort similar to enabling VMware HA).
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Yes - Clustered Pool
Oracle VM will restart HA-enabled Guests on remaining Hosts in case of Host failure. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Automatic VM Reset
Details
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No
There is no automated restart/reset of individual virtual machines e.g. to protect against OS failure
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Yes
Oracle VM will restart Guests on the same Host due to OS Failures. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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VM Lockstep Protection
Details
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No
While XenServer can perform VM restart in case of a host failure there is no integrated mechanism to provide zero downtime failover functionality.
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No
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Application/Service HA
Details
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No
There is no application monitoring/restart capability provided with XenServer
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No
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Replication / Site Failover
Details
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Integrated Disaster Recovery (no storage array control)
XenServer 6 introduced the new Integrated Site Recovery (maintained in 6.5), replacing the StorageLink Gateway Site Recovery used in previous versions. It utilizes the native remote data replication between physical storage arrays and automates the recovery and failback capabilities. The new approach removes the Windows VM requirement for the StorageLink Gateway components and it works now with any iSCSI or Hardware HBA storage repository (rather only the restricted storage options with StorageLink support). You can perform failover, failback and test failover. You can configure and operate it using the Disaster Recovery option in XenCenter. Please note however that Site Recovery does NOT interact with the Storage array, so you will have to e.g. manually break mirror relationships before failing over. You will need to ensure that the virtual disks as well as the pool meta data (containing all the configuration data required to recreate your vims and vApps) are correctly replicated to your secondary site.
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Yes
If the Storage is Replicated the whole environment can be orchestrated to be up and running in minutes if the Failover Site already has the Oracle VM up and running pointing to the Replicated Storage with the help of Oracle Site Guard. More info on: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/vm/ovm3-disaster-recovery-1872591.pdf
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Management
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General |
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Central Management
Details
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Yes (XenCenter), SCVMM (see details)
XenCenter is the central Windows-based multi-server management application (client) for XenServer hosts (including the open source version).
It is different to other management apps (e.g. SCVMM or vCenter) which typically have a management server/management client architecture where the management server holds centralized configuration information (typically in a 3rd party DB). Unlike these management consoles, XenCenter distributes management data across XenServer servers (hosts) in a resource pool to ensure there is no single point of management failure. If a management server (host) should fail, any other server in the pool can take over the management role. XenCenter is essentially only the client.
License administration is done using a separate web interface.
XenServer 6 introduced the ability to manage XenServer hosts and VMs with System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) 2012. System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) 2012 will also be able to manage and monitor XenServer hosts and VMs. System Center integration is available with a special supplemental pack from Citrix.
Citrix announced with v 6.2 that several features will not be further developed and will be removed in a later release. These deprecated features function as in XenServer 6.1.0 and will remain supported, providing a period of overlap while third-party products or alternative solutions are established.
WLB has returned to XenServer 6.5 (Enterprise Edition) having been retired with the launch of XenServer 6.2. The deprecation notice for DVSC has also been rescinded within XenServer 6.5.
This initially included: Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager (SCVMM) support
However, Citrix confirmed: Citrix is not deprecating support for SCVMM. However, SCVMM 2012 R2 does not currently support XS 6.2 (this being a Microsoft decision), because XS 6.2 was not released in time for this to happen).
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Yes - OVM Manager & Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control in addition to Oracle VM Manager for Central Management. OEM13c Cloud Control extends Oracle VM Manager with Cloud Capabilities. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E64082/html/index.html and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/GUID-152C4D4A-6FC2-42B0-ABE3-5884D6A466F4.htm#EMCLO180
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Virtual and Physical
Details
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No
XenCenter focusses on managing the virtual infrastructure (XenServer host and the associated virtual machines).
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Yes - Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to provision and manage Virtual Guests, Oracle VM Hosts and Physical Servers. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMLCM/GUID-E1076C88-A0FE-4F2C-AD58-1E4A3BA32757.htm
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RBAC / AD-Integration
Details
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Yes (hosts/XenCenter)
XenServer 5.6 introduced Role Based Access Control by allowing the mapping of a user (or a group of users) to defined roles (a named set of permissions), which in turn have the ability to perform certain operations. RBAC depends on Active Directory for authentication services. Specifically, XenServer keeps a list of authorized users based on Active Directory user and group accounts. As a result, you must join the pool to the domain and add Active Directory accounts before you can assign roles.
There are 6 default roles: Pool Admin, Pool Operator, VM Power Admin, VM Admin, VM Operator and Read Only - which can be listed and modified using the xe CLI.
Details here: http://bit.ly/1E2HvQ7
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Yes - Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to provide RBAC/ AD-Integration or LDAP-compliant director server. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMSEC/GUID-5DD3B11A-1159-40BD-8AEB-41EDE664AB12.htm#EMSEC13094 and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMSEC/GUID-5DD3B11A-1159-40BD-8AEB-41EDE664AB12.htm#EMSEC12846
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Cross-Vendor Mgmt
Details
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No (native)
Yes (Vendor Add-On: CloudPlatform)
XenCenter only manages Citrix XenServer hosts.
Comments:
- Citrixs Desktop Virtualization product (XenDesktop, fee based add-on) supports multiple hypervisors (ESX, XenServer, Hyper-V)
- Citrixs CloudPlatform supports multiple hypervisors including Citrix XenServer, Xen, KVM, VMware vSphere and Oracle VM (multiple hypervisors within a single cloud)
- The Citrix XenServer Conversion Manager in 6.1 now enables batch import of VMs created with VMware products into a XenServer pool to reduce costs of converting to a XenServer environment).
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Yes - Adding 3rd Party Plug-in from Bluemedora Partner
Classified as limited because it is not a default feature and 3rd party plugin is needed. More info on: http://www.bluemedora.com/products/plugin-for-vmware/
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Browser Based Mgmt
Details
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No (Web Self Service: retired)
Web Self Service (retired with the launch of XenServer 6.2) was a lightweight portal which allowed individuals to operate their own virtual machines without having administrator credentials to the XenServer host. For large infrastructures, Citrix CloudPlatform is a full orchestration product with far greater capability; for a lightweight alternative, xvpsource.org offers a free open source product.
Related Citrix products have browser based access, examples are Storefront (next generation of Web Interface) and Citrixs (separate) CloudPortal product line that contains CloudPortal Service Manager, a web portal for onboarding, provisioning and customer self-service http://www.citrix.com/English/ps2/products/feature.asp?contentID=2316906
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Yes - OVM Manager & Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control
Both Oracle VM Manager and Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control are HTML Browser Based Mgmt. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E64082/html/index.html and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/GUID-152C4D4A-6FC2-42B0-ABE3-5884D6A466F4.htm#EMCLO180
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Adv. Operation Management
Details
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No
There is no advanced operations management tool included with XenServer.
Additional Info:
XenServers Integration Suite Supplemental Pack allows inter-operation with Microsofts System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 (SCVMM) and Systems Center Operations Manager (SCOM). SCOM enables monitoring of host performance when installed on a XenServer host.
Both of these tools can be integrated with your XenServer pool by installing the Integration Suite Supplemental Pack on each of your XenServer hosts.
For virtual desktop environments Citrix EdgeSight is a performance and availability management solution for XenDesktop, XenApp and endpoint systems. EdgeSight monitors applications, devices, sessions, license usage, and the network in real time, allowing users to quickly analyze, resolve, and proactively prevent problems.
System Center and EdgeSight are separate products not included with the XenServer license.
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Yes - Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control for Advanced Operation Management. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E64082/html/index.html and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/GUID-152C4D4A-6FC2-42B0-ABE3-5884D6A466F4.htm#EMCLO180
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Updates and Backup |
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Hypervisor Upgrades
Details
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The XenCenter released with XenServer 6.5 allows updates to be applied to all versions of XenServer (commercial and free)
With XenServer 6.5 patching and updating via the XenCenter management console (enabling automated GUI driven patch application and upgrades) is supported with the comercial and free XenServer versions.
XenServer 6 introduced the Rolling Pool Upgrade Wizard. The Wizard simplifies upgrades to XenServer 6.x by performing pre-checks with a step-by-step process that blocks unsupported upgrades. You can choose between automated or semi-automated, where automated can use a network based XenServer update repository (which you have to create) while semi-automated requires local install media. There are still manual steps required for both approaches and no scheduling functionality or online repository is integrated.
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Yes
Oracle VM provides the capability to upgrade the OVM Servers by the usage of Oracle VM Manager or Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control with Zero Downtime, Migrating (Live) the VMs to other Hosts in the Cluster/Server Pool. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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No
There is no integrated update engine for guest OS of the virtual machines
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Yes
Oracle provides Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control for Linux Patching. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMLCM/GUID-91D92136-E452-48C6-AD49-3D88E8CC575F.htm#EMLCM11557
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yes
You can take regular snapshots, application consistent point-in-time snapshots (requires Microsoft VSS) and snapshots with memory of a running or suspended VM. All snapshot activities (take/delete/revert) can be done while VM is online.
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Yes - Hot Clones
Oracle provides the ability to execute Hot Clones that works similarly to Snapshots, but ther is no Snapshot Manager. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Backup Integration API
Details
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Limited
There is no specific backup framework for integration of 3rd party backup solutions as such however the XenServer API allows for scripting (e.g. utilizing XenServer snapshots) and basic integration with 3rd party backup products and scripting (e.g. utilizing XenServer snapshots) e.g. PHD backup
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Yes
Is possible to perform classic backup using agents in the guests but due to the REST API for both OVM Manager and EM13c Cloud Control any time soon there will be integration on the Hypervisor Level
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Integrated Backup
Details
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No (Retired)
Citrix retired the Virtual Machine Protection and Recovery (VMPR) in XenServer 6.2. VMPR was the method of backing up snapshots as Virtual Appliances.
Alternative backup products are available from Quadric Software, SEP, and PHD Virtual
Background:
With XenServer 6, VM Protection and Recovery (VMPR) became available for Advanced, Enterprise and Platinum Edition customers.
XenServer 5.6 SP1 introduced a basic XenCenter-based backup and restore facility, the VM Protection and Recovery (VMPR) which provides a simple backup and restore utility for your
critical vims. Regular scheduled snapshots are taken automatically and can be used to restore VMs in case of disaster. Scheduled snapshots can also be automatically archived to a remote CIFS or NFS share, providing an additional level of security.
Additionally the XenServer API allows for scripting of snapshots. You can also (manually or script) export and import virtual machines for backup purposes.
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No
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Deployment |
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Automated Host Deployments
Details
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No
There is no integrated host deployment mechanism in XenServer - manual local or network repository based deployments are required.
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to automate Host Deployments (both Oracle VM Servers and Physical/Virtual Oracle Linux Servers). More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMLCM/GUID-CBC1C903-8541-40BC-A0B2-E5B57F389DE7.htm#EMLCM11421
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Yes
Templates in XenServer are either the included pre-configured empty virtual machines which require an OS install (a shell with appropriate settings for the guest OS) or you can convert an installed (and e.g. sysprep-ed) VM into a custom template.
There is no integrated customization of the guest available, i.e. you need to sysprep manually.
You can NOT convert a template back into a VM for easy updates. You deploy a VM from template using a full copy or a fast clone using copy on write.
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Yes
Oracle offers the ability to create and deploy both Templates and Virtual Appliances. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Tiered VM Templates
Details
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vApp
XenServer 6 introduced vApps - maintained with v 6.5
A vApp is logical group of one or more related Virtual Machines (VMs) which can be started up as a single entity in the event of a disaster.
The primary functionality of a XenServer vApp is to start the VMs contained within the vApp in a user predefined order, to allow VMs which depend upon one another to be automatically sequenced. This means that an administrator no longer has to manually sequence the startup of dependent VMs should a whole service require restarting (for instance in the case of a software update). The VMs within the vApp do not have to reside on one host and will be distributed within a pool using the normal rules.
This also means that the XenServer vApp has a more basic capability than e.g. VMwares vApp or MSs Service Templates which contain more advanced functions.
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Yes
Oracle offers the ability to create and deploy both Templates and Virtual Appliances. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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No
There is no integrated capability to create host templates, apply or check hosts for compliance with certain setting.
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to automate Host Deployments with a defined baseline and it is also possible to compare configurations between Hosts. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMLCM/GUID-BC478C2B-A4D9-4855-80A2-4A00D63FC302.htm#EMLCM11613
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No
There are is no ability to associate storage profiles to tiers of storage resources in XenServer (e.g. to facilitate automated compliance storage tiering)
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No
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Other |
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No
A resource pool in XenServer is hierarchically the equivalent of a vSphere or Hyper-V cluster. There is no functionality to sub-divide resources within a pool.
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No
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No (XenConvert: retired), V2V: yes
XenConvert was retired in XenServer 6.2
XenConvert allowed conversion of a single physical machine to a virtual machine. The ability to do this conversion is included in the Provisioning Services (PVS) product shipped as part of XenDesktop. Alternative products support the transition of large environments and are available from PlateSpin.
Note: The XenServer Conversion Manager, for converting virtual machines (V2V), remains fully supported.
Background:
XenConvert supported the following sources: physical (online) Windows systems OVF, VHD, VMDK or XVA onto these targets: XenServer directly, vhd, OVF or PVS vdisk
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Yes
Oracle offers the same media used to install the Hypervisors as the P2V and V2V Converter. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Self Service Portal
Details
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No (Web Self Service: retired in XS6.2)
Web Self Service was a lightweight portal which allowed individuals to operate their own virtual machines without having administrator credentials to the XenServer host. For large infrastructures, Citrix CloudPlatform is a full orchestration product with far greater capability; for a lightweight alternative, xvpsource.org offers a free open source product.
Related Citrix products have browser based access, examples are Storefront (next generation of Web Interface) http://bit.ly/14IKAXq, and Citrixs (separate) CloudPortal product line that contains CloudPortal Service Manager, a web portal for onboarding, provisioning and customer self-service http://bit.ly/1C3i262
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to create Self Service Portals with Service Catalogues, Billing, Quotas and so on. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/GUID-88E5C1CF-B37B-4F0A-8D1A-284C771885EA.htm#EMCLO222
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Orchestration / Workflows
Details
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Yes (Workflow Studio)
Workflow Studio provides a graphical interface for workflow composition in order to reduce scripting. Workflow Studio allows administrators to tie technology components together via workflows. Workflow Studio is built on top of Windows PowerShell and Windows Workflow Foundation. It natively supports Citrix products including XenApp, XenDesktop, XenServer and NetScaler.
Available as component of XenDesktop suite, Workflow Studio was retired in XenDesktop 7.x
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to create Self Service Portals with Workflows to provision VMs or to create Jobs to automate Manual Tasks. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/index.htm
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Basic (NetScaler - Fee-Based Add-On)
XenServer uses netfilter/iptables firewalling. There are no specific frameworks or APIs for antivirus or firewall integration.
The fee-based NetScaler provides various (network) security related capabilities through e.g.
- NetScaler Gateway: secure application and data access for Citrix XenApp, Citrix XenDesktop and Citrix XenMobile)
- NetScaler AppFirewall: secures web applications, prevents inadvertent or intentional disclosure of confidential information and aids in compliance with information security regulations such as PCI-DSS. AppFirewall is available as a standalone security appliance or as a fully integrated module of the NetScaler application delivery solution and is included with Citrix NetScaler, Platinum Edition.
Details here: http://bit.ly/17ttmKk
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Yes
The whole OVM Infrastructure, including Oracle VM Manager, Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control and Oracle VM Servers are secure by default due to the usage of SSL encryption and Certificate Based Authentication. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMSEC/toc.htm and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E64084/html/index.html
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Systems Management
Details
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Yes (API / SDKs, CIM)
XenServer includes a XML-RPC based API, providing programmatic access to the extensive set of XenServer management features and tools. The XenServer API can be called from a remote system as well as local to the XenServer host. Remote calls are generally made securely over HTTPS, using port 443.
XenServer SDK: There are five SDKs available, one for each of C, C#, Java, PowerShell, and Python. For XenServer 6.0.2 and earlier, these were provided under an open-source license (LGPL or GPL with the common linking exception). This allows use (unmodified) in both closed-and open-source applications. From XenServer 6.1 onwards the bindings are in the majority provided under a BSD license that allows modifications.
Citrix Project Kensho provided a Common Information Model (CIM) interface to the XenServer API and introduces a Web Services Management (WSMAN) interface to XenServer. Management agents can be installed and run in the Dom0 guest.
Details here: http://bit.ly/12nQl9f
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control and Ops Center for Oracle Hardware alerting and Monitoring, both Web/CLI Based. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/index.htm
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Network and Storage
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Storage |
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Supported Storage
Details
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Yes (limited for SAS)
Dynamic multipathing support is available for Fibre Channel and iSCSI storage arrays (round robin is default balancing mode). XenServer also supports the LSI Multi-Path Proxy Driver (MPP) for the Redundant Disk Array Controller (RDAC) - by default this driver is disabled. Multipathing to SAS based SANs is not enabled, changes must typically be made to XenServer as SAS drives do not readily appear as emulated SCSI LUNs.
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Yes
Support for NAS: Network Attached Storage, FC: Fibre Channel, iSCSI, FCoE. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes (SR)
XenServer uses the concept of Storage Repositories (disk containers/data stores). These SRs can be shared between hosts or dedicated to particular hosts. Shared storage is pooled between multiple hosts within a defined resource pool. All hosts in a single resource pool must have at least one shared SR in common. NAS, iSCSI (Software initiator and HBA are both supported), SAS, or FC are supported for shared storage.
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Yes
Multipath included. In addition to that Oracle offers the Connect Storage Plug-in to simplify Storage Management via Oracle VM Manager or EM13c Cloud Control. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/ and http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/virtualization/ovm3-storage-connect-459309.pdf
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Shared File System
Details
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Yes (iSCSI, FC)
Yes for XenServer 6.1 and later (XenServer 5.6 SP1 added support for boot from SAN with multi-pathing support for Fibre Channel and iSCSI HBAs)
Note: Rolling Pool Upgrade should not be used with Boot from SAN environments. For more information on upgrading boot from SAN environments see Appendix B of the XenServer 6.5.0 Installation Guide: http://bit.ly/1E33XZs
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Yes
OCFS2 included. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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No
While there are several (unofficial) approaches documented, officially no flash drives are supported as boot media for XenServer 6.x.
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Yes
Yes for SAN Boot with FC. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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vhd, raw disk (LUN)
XenServer supports file based vhd (NAS, local), block device-based vhd (FC, SAS, iSCSI) using a Logical Volume Manager on the Storage Repository or a full LUN (raw disk)
|
Yes
Technically is possible but not officialy supported by Oracle. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Virtual Disk Format
Details
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2TB
For XenServer 6.5 the maximum virtual disk sizes are:
- NFS: 2TB minus 4GB
- LVM (block): 2TB minus 4 GB
Reference: http://bit.ly/17eNuo7
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Raw Images (*.img files)
If a disk is created from OVM Manager it is created by default as a QCOW image and if it is imported it is converted from the original format to QCOW Images. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes (Limitations on block)
XenServer supports 3 different types of storage repositories (SR)
1) File based vhd, which is a local ext3 or remote NFS filesystems, which supports thin provisioning for vhd
2) Block device-based vhd format (SAN based on FC, iSCSI, SAS) , which has no support for thin provisioning of the virtual disk but supports thin prove for snapshots
3) LUN based raw format - a full LUN is mapped as virtual disk image (VDI) so to is only applicable if the storage array HW supports that functionality.
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10 TB (if Virtual Disk on OCFS2), Maximum supported on the Guest OS/Filesystem (if Raw Disks)
For NFS there is no limit specified since it depends on the Backend Local Filesystem of the NFS Server. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Thin Disk Provisioning
Details
|
|
No
There is no NPIV support for XenServer
|
Yes
Oracle provides the ability to create Sparse Disks and Thin Cloning for efficient disks usage based on the actual usage in addition to Non-Sparse Disks for full space allocation. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes - Clone on boot (new), clone, PVS, MCS
XenServer 6.2 introduced Clone on Boot
This feature supports Machine Creation Services (MCS) which is shipped as part of XenDesktop. Clone on boot allows rapid deployment of hundreds of transient desktop images from a single source, with the images being automatically destroyed and their disk space freed on exit.
General cloning capabilities: When cloning VMs based off a single VHD template, each child VM forms a chain where new changes are written to the new VM, and old blocks are directly read from the parent template. When this is done with a file based vhd (NFS) then the clone is thin provisioned. Chains up to a depth of 30 are supported but beware performance implications.
Comment: Citrixs desktop virtualization solution (XenDesktop) provides two additional technologies that use image sharing approaches:
- Provisioning Services (PVS) provides a (network) streaming technology that allows images to be provisioned from a single shared-disk image. Details: http://bit.ly/1ICMeqv
- With Machine Creation Services (MCS) all desktops in a catalog will be created off a Master Image. When creating the catalog you select the Master and choose if you want to deploy a pooled or dedicated desktop catalog from this image.
Note that neither PVS (for virtual machines) or MCS are included in the base XenServer license.
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No
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No
There is no integrated (software-based) storage replication capability available within XenServer
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Yes
This technology is named Thin Cloning in Oracle VM provided by OCFS2 filesystem. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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SW Storage Replication
Details
|
|
IntelliCache and memory read cache
XenServer 6.5 sees the introduction of a read caching feature that uses host memory in the new 64-bit Dom0 to reduce IOPS on storage networks, improve LoginVSI scores with VMs booting up to 3x Faster. The read cache feature is available for XenDesktop & XenApp Platinum users who have an entitlement to this feature.
IntelliCache is a XenServer feature that can (only!) be used in a XenDesktop deployment to cache temporary and non-persistent operating-system data on the local XenServer host. It is of particular benefit when many Virtual Machines (VMs) all share a common OS image. The load on the storage array is reduced and performance is enhanced. In addition, network traffic to and from shared storage is reduced as the local storage caches the master image from shared storage.
IntelliCache works by caching data from a VMs parent VDI in local storage on the VM host. This local cache is then populated as data is read from the parent VDI. When many VMs share a common parent VDI (for example by all being based on a particular master image), the data pulled into the cache by a read from one VM can be used by another VM. This means that further access to the master image on shared storage is not required.
Reference: http://bit.ly/14Ko14u
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No
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No
There is no specific Storage Virtualization appliance capability other than the abstraction of storage resources through the hypervisor.
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No
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Integrated StorageLink (deprecated)
XenServer 6.5 sees the retirement of the Integrated StorageLink Feature, which is line with deprecation notice given in XenServer 6.2 and detailed in the XenServer 6.5 release notes
With XenServer 6.2 Citrix announced that Integrated StorageLink (iSL) is a deprecated feature (development stopped on it and removal in a future release).
Background: XenServer 6 introduced Integrated StorageLink Capabilities. It replaces the StorageLink Gateway technology used in previous editions and removes the requirement
to run a VM with the StorageLink components. It provides access to use existing storage array-based features such as data replication, de-duplication, snapshot and
cloning. Citrix StorageLink allows to integrate with existing storage systems, gives a common user interface across vendors and talks the language of the storage array i.e. exposes the native feature set in the storage array. StorageLink also provides a set of open APIs that link XenServer and Hyper-V environments to third party backup solutions and enterprise management frameworks. There is a limited HCL for StorageLink supporting arrays. Details: http://bit.ly/1xS2J0m
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No
|
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Storage Integration (API)
Details
|
|
Basic
Virtual disks on block-based SRs (e.g. FC, iSCSI) have an optional I/O priority Quality of Service (QoS) setting. This setting can be applied to existing virtual disks using the xe CLI.
Note: Bare in mind that QoS setting are applied to virtual disks accessing the LUN from the same host. QoS is not applied across hosts in the pool!
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Yes
Oracle offers the Storace Connect Plug-in (included in Oracle VM subscriptions) that simplify storage management like LUN creation, removal, resize and other features directly by the use of Oracle VM Manager. More info on: http://www.oracle.com/us/technologies/virtualization/ovm3-storage-connect-459309.pdf
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Yes (Open vSwitch) - distributed vSwitch
The Open vSwitch remains fully supported and developed with the earlier deprecation notice issued with XenServer 6.2 now rescinded within XenServer 6.5
Background: Open vSwitch is the default networking stack in XenServer 6.x.
An Open vSwitch (OVS) network flow is a match between a network packet header and an action
such as forward or drop. A typical server VM could have hundreds or more connections to clients,
and OVS needs to have a flow for each of these connections. As the number of VMs on the host
builds up, the OVS flow table in the Dom0 kernel fills and induces round-trips to the OVS userspace
process, which can degrade the network throughput to and from guests. In OVS v1.4, present in
XenServer 6.2, the flow had to have an exact match for the header. XenServer 6.5 includes the latest
version, OVS 2.1.3, which supports megaflows.
Megaflow support reduces the number of required entries in the flow table for most common
situations and improves the ability of Dom0 to handle many server VMs connected to a large
number of clients.
Details in the XenServer 6.5 vSwitch Controller Users Guide: http://bit.ly/1zLZ8NI
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No
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Networking |
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Advanced Network Switch
Details
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Yes (incl. LACP - New)
XenServer 6.1 added the following functionality, maintained with XenServer 6.5:
- Link Aggregation Control Protocol (LACP) support: enables the use of industry-standard network bonding features to provide fault-tolerance and load balancing of network traffic.
- Source Load Balancing (SLB) improvements: allows up to 4 NICs to be used in an active-active bond. This improves total network throughput and increases fault tolerance in the event of hardware failures. The SLB balancing algorithm has been modified to reduce load on switches in large deployments.
Background:
XenServer provides support for active-active, active-passive, and LACP bonding modes. The number of NICs supported and the bonding mode supported varies according to network stack:
• LACP bonding is only available for the vSwitch, while active-active and active-passive are available for both the vSwitch and Linux bridge.
• When the vSwitch is the network stack, you can bond either two, three, or four NICs.
• When the Linux bridge is the network stack, you can only bond two NICs.
XenServer 6.1 provides three different types of bonds, all of which can be configured using either the CLI or XenCenter:
• Active/Active mode, with VM traffic balanced between the bonded NICs.
• Active/Passive mode, where only one NIC actively carries traffic.
• LACP Link Aggregation, in which active and stand-by NICs are negotiated between the switch and the server.
Reference: http://bit.ly/1E2HvQ7
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Yes
Support for Centralized vSwitch included. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes (limited for mgmt. traffic)
VLANs are supported with XenServer. To use VLANs with virtual machines use switch ports configured as 802.1Q VLAN trunk ports in combination with the XenServer VLAN feature to connect guest virtual network interfaces (VIFs) to specific VLANs (you can create new virtual networks with XenCenter and specify the VLLAN IDs). The XenServer management interfaces cannot be assigned to a XenServer VLAN via a trunk port - to place management traffic on a desired VLAN the switch ports need to be configured to perform 802.1Q VLAN tagging/untagging (native VLAN or as access mode ports). In this case the XenServer host is unaware of any VLAN configuration.
XenServer 6.1 removed a previous limitation which caused VM deployment delays when large numbers of VLANs were in use. This improvement enables administrators using XenServer 6.x to deploy hundreds of VLANs in a XenServer pool quickly.
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Yes
Support for Active/Backup Bonding, Load Balancer Bonding, LACP Bonding. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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No
XenServer does not support PVLANs.
Please refer to the Citrix XenServer Design: Designing XenServer Network Configurations guide for details on network design and security considerations http://bit.ly/14LW9b9
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Yes
Support for VLAN Interfaces included. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes (guests only)
XenServer 6.1 introduced formal support for IPv6 in XenServer guest VMs (maintained with 6.5). Customers already used it with e.g. 6.0 but the 6.1 release notes list this as new official feature: IPv6 Guest Support: enables the use of IPv6 addresses within guests allowing network administrators to plan for network growth.
Full support for IPv6 (i.e. assigning the host itself an IPv6 address) will be addressed in the future.
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No
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SR-IOV
XenServer 6.0 provided improved SR-IOV support, maintained with v 6.5
Note that SR-IOV is supported only with SR-IOV enabled NICs listed on the XenServer Hardware
Compatibility List and only when used in conjunction with a Windows Server 2008 guest and requires Intel VT-d capable systems. Generally with SR-IOV VF, functions that require VM mobility like live migration, workload balancing, rolling pool upgrade, High Availability and Disaster Recovery are not possible.
|
Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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|
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Yes
You can set the Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU) for a XenServer network in the New Network wizard or for an existing network in its Properties window. The possible MTU value range is 1500 to 9216.
|
Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes (TSO)
TCP Segmentation Offload can be enabled, see http://bit.ly/13e9WLi
By default, Large Receive Offload (LRO) and Generic Receive Offload (GRO) are disabled on all physical network interfaces. Though unsupported, you can enable it manually http://bit.ly/14l79kp
|
Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Yes (outgoing)
QoS of network transmissions can be done either at the vm level (basic) by setting a ks/sec limit for the virtual NIC or on the vSwitch-level (global policies). With the DVS you can select a rate limit (with units), and a burst size (with units). Traffic to all virtual NICs included in this policy level (e.g. you can create vm groups) is limited to the specified rate, with individual bursts limited to the specified number of packets. To prevent inheriting existing enforcement the QoS policy at the VM level should be disabled.
Background:
To limit the amount of outgoing data a VM can send per second, you can set an optional Quality of Service (QoS) value on VM virtual interfaces (VIFs). The setting lets you specify a maximum transmit rate for outgoing packets in kilobytes per second.
The QoS value limits the rate of transmission from the VM. As with many QoS approaches the QoS setting does not limit the amount of data the VM can receive. If such a limit is desired, Citrix recommends limiting the rate of incoming packets higher up in the network (for example, at the switch level).
Depending on networking stack configured in the pool, you can set the Quality of Service (QoS) value on VM virtual interfaces (VIFs) in one of two places-either a) on the vSwitch Controller or b) in XenServer (using theCLI or XenCenter).
|
Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E50245_01/index.html
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Yes (Port Mirroring)
The XenServer vSwitch has Traffic Mirroring capabilities. The Remote Switched Port Analyzer (RSPAN) policies support mirroring traffic sent or received on
a VIF to a VLAN in order to support traffic monitoring applications. Use the Port Configuration tab in the vSwitch Controller UI to configure policies that apply to the VIF ports.
|
No
|
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|
Traffic Monitoring
Details
|
|
Yes (DMC)
XenServer 5.6 introduced Dynamic Memory Control (DMC) that enables dynamic reallocation of memory between VMs. This capability is maintained in 6.x.
XenServer DMC (sometimes known as 'dynamic memory optimization', 'memory overcommit' or 'memory ballooning') works by automatically adjusting the memory of running VMs, keeping the amount of memory allocated to each VM between specified minimum and maximum memory values, guaranteeing performance and permitting greater density of VMs per server. Without DMC, when a server is full, starting further VMs will fail with 'out of memory' errors: to reduce the existing VM memory allocation and make room for more VMs you must edit each VMs memory allocation and then reboot the VM. With DMC enabled, even when the server is full, XenServer will attempt to reclaim memory by automatically reducing the current memory allocation of running VMs within their defined memory ranges.
|
Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/ and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMLCM/GUID-2256CB37-5A22-4DDE-A3E3-9C87EC08FD81.htm#EMLCM93821
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Hypervisor
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General |
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Hypervisor Details/Size
Details
|
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XenServer 6.5: Xen 4.4 -based
NEW
XenServer is based on the open-source Xen hypervisor (XenServer 6.5 now runs on the Xen 4.4 hypervisor, provides GPT support and a smaller, more scalable Dom0). XenServer automatically scales the amount of memory allocated to the Control Domain (Dom0) based on the physical memory available.
XenServer uses paravirtualization and hardware-assisted virtualization, requiring either a modified guest OSs or hardware assisted CPUs (more commonly seen as its less restrictive and hardware assisted CPUs like Intel VT/AMD-V have become standard). The device drivers are provided through a 64-bit Linux-based guest (CentOS) running in a control virtual machine (Dom0). The Xen hypervisor itself is small (e.g. the download of Xen 3.4.3 including tools is 10MB). The disk footprint of XenServer varies (recommended 16GB min) mainly due to the size of the Dom0 OS (e.g. XenServer 5.6 creates 2x4GB partitions by default).
|
Xen Hypervisor - Bare Metal - Java Based Centralizaed Management Interface
The Xen Hypervisor is 1MB, the installation of OVM Server which includes the Xen Hypervisor plus the dom0 (Management/Control Domain) requires 6GB of space. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/ and https://wiki.xen.org/wiki/Xen_Project_Software_Overview
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Host Config |
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Max Consolidation Ratio
Details
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1000 VMs per host
Citrix has listed the new maximum consolidation ratios for XenServer 6.5 Service Pack 1 within the published configuration limits document http://bit.ly/1NA7m6h
- Concurrent VMs per host (Windows): 1000
- Concurrent protected VMs per host with HA enabled: 500
Disclaimers are:
- The maximum number of VMs/host supported is dependent on VM workload, system load, and certain environmental factors. Citrix reserves the right to determine what specific environmental factors affect the maximum limit at which a system can function. For systems running over 500 VMs, Citrix recommends allocating 8GB RAM and 8 exclusively pinned vCPUs to dom0, and setting the OVS flow-eviction-threshold to 8192.
The maximum amount of logical physical processors supported differs by CPU. Please consult the XenServer Hardware Compatibility List for more details on the maximum amount of logical cores supported per vendor and CPU.
Each plugged VBD or plugged VIF or Windows VM reduces this number by 1
|
Max Virtual CPU per Host - 4096
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E76173/html/vmrns-limits.html
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160 (logical)
XenServer 6.5 supports up to 160 Logical CPUs (threads) e.g. 4 socket with 8 cores each and Hyper-Threading enabled = 64 logical CPUs
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384
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E76173/html/vmrns-limits.html
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Max Cores per CPU
Details
|
|
unlimited
The XenServer license does not restrict the number of cores per CPU
|
N/A
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Max Memory / Host
Details
|
|
1TB
XenServer supports a maximum of 1TB per host, if a host has one or more 32-bit VMs running then a maximum of 128 GB RAM is supported on the host
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6 TB
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E76173/html/vmrns-limits.html
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VM Config |
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|
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16 (Win) / 32(Linux)
You can only specify up to 16 vCPUs using the XenCenter GUI (you can increase this for Linux guests using the command line e.g. xe vm-param-set VCPUs-max=32 uuid=...). Actual numbers vary with the guest OS version (e.g. license restrictions), see http://bit.ly/1ELdzpv for details.
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128 (Windows) & 256 (Linux)
This max number will vary accordingly to Guest Type and Architecture. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E76173/html/vmrns-limits.html
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192GB
NEW
A maximum of 192GB is supported for guest Oss, actual number varies greatly with guest OS version so please check for specific guest support.
The maximum amount of physical memory addressable by your operating system varies. Setting the memory to a level greater than the operating system supported limit, may lead to performance issues within your guest. Some 32-bit Windows operating systems can support more than 4 GB of RAM through use of the physical address extension (PAE) mode. The limit for 32-bit PV Virtual Machines is 64GB. Please consult your guest operating system Administrators Guide and the XenServer Virtual Machine Users Guide for more details. Details here: http://bit.ly/14DILov
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2 TB
This max number will vary accordingly to Guest Type and Architecture. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E76173/html/vmrns-limits.html
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No
You can not configure serial ports (as virtual hardware) for your VM
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No
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No (except mass storage)
XenServer doesn’t natively support USB passthrough of anything but mass storage devices.
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No
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Yes (disk, NIC)
XenServer supports adding of disks and network adapters while the VM is running - hot plug requires the specific guest OS to support these functions - please check for specific support with your OS vendor.
|
Yes
It is possible to add CPU, RAM, Disks and Networking in a running VM (It depends on Guest OS type/version). More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Graphic Acceleration
Details
|
|
DAS, SAS, iSCSI, NAS, FC, FCoE
XenServer data stores are called Storage Repositories (SRs), they support IDE, SATA, SCSI (physical HBA as well as SW initiator) and SAS drives locally connected, and iSCSI, NFS, SAS and Fibre Channel remotely connected.
Background: The SR and VDI abstractions allow advanced storage features such as Thin Provisioning, VDI snapshots, and fast cloning to be exposed on storage targets that support them. For storage subsystems that do not inherently support advanced operations directly, a software stack is provided based on Microsofts Virtual Hard Disk (VHD)
specification which implements these features.
SRs are storage targets containing virtual disk images (VDIs). SR commands provide operations for creating, destroying, resizing, cloning, connecting and discovering the individual VDIs that they contain.
Reference XenServer 6.5.0 Administrators Guide: http://bit.ly/1E2HvQ7
Also refer to the XenServer Hardware Compatibility List (HCL) for more details.
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No
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Memory |
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Dynamic / Over-Commit
Details
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No
XenServer does not feature any transparent page sharing algorithm.
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No
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Memory Page Sharing
Details
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No
There is no support for large memory pages in XenServer
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No
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Yes
Yes, XenServer supports Intel EPT and AMD-RVI, see http://bit.ly/1FYAJKl
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Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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HW Memory Translation
Details
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Yes, incl. vApp
XenServer 6 introduced the ability to create multi-VM and boot sequenced virtual appliances (vApps) that integrate with Integrated Site Recovery and High Availability. vApps can be easily imported and exported using the Open Virtualization Format (OVF) standard. There is full support for VM disk and OVF appliance imports directly from XenCenter with the ability to change VM parameters (virtual processor, virtual memory, virtual interfaces, and target storage repository) with the Import wizard. Full OVF import support for XenServer, XenConvert and VMware.
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Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Interoperability |
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Improving
XenServer has an improving HCL featuring the major vendors and technologies but compared to e.g. VMware and Microsoft the list is somewhat limited - so check support first. Links to XenServer HCL and XenServer hardware verification test kits are here: http://hcl.xensource.com/
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Yes
Supported. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/
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Good
XenServer 6.5 Service Pack 1 support for:
- Microsoft Windows 10
- Microsoft Windows Server 2012
- Ubuntu 14.14
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP3, SLED 11SP3, SLES 12
- Scientific Linux 5.11, 6.6, 7.0, 7.1
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 5.10, 5.11, 6.5, 6.6, 7.0, 7.1
- Oracle Enterprise Linux (OEL) 5.10, 5.11, 6.5, 6.6, 7.0, 7.1
- Oracle UEK 6.5
- CentOS 5.10, 5.11, 6.5, 6.5, 7.0, 7.1
- Debian 7.2 'Jessie'
- VSS support for Windows Server 2008R2 has been improved and reintroduced
Refer to the XenServer 6.5 Service Pack 1 Virtual Machine User Guide for details: http://bit.ly/1JdLV4R
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Yes
HCL Site: http://linux.oracle.com/pls/apex/f?p=117:1:2026809683820822:::::
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Yes (SDK, API, PowerShell)
The Software Development Kit provides the architectural overview of the APIs and use of SDK tools provided: http://bit.ly/13eawJ2
The XenServer 6.2 management API is documented in detail here: http://bit.ly/13eaocy
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Yes
Supported Guests: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/E76173/html/vmrns-guest-os-x86.html
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Container Support
Details
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CloudStack APIs, support for AWS API
Citrix CloudPlatform uses a RESTful CloudStack API. In addition to supporting the CloudStack API, CloudPlatform supports the Amazon Web Services (AWS) API. Future cloud API standards from bodies such as the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF) will be implemented as they become available.
Details on the CloudPlatform API here: http://bit.ly/13eaDo0
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Yes
Restfull API. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/ and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/toc.htm
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CloudPlatform
Note: Due to the variation in actual cloud requirements, different deployment model (private, public, hybrid) and use cases (IaaS, PaaS etc) the matrix will only list the available products and capabilities. It will not list evaluations (green, amber, red) rather than providing the information that will help you to evaluate it for YOUR environment.
After the acquisition of Cloud.com in July 2011, Citrix has centered its cloud capabilities around its CloudPlatform suite.
Citrix CloudPlatform (latest release 4.3.0.2) powered by Apache CloudStack - is an open source cloud computing platform that pools computing resources to build public, private, and hybrid Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) clouds. CloudPlatform manages the network, storage, and compute nodes that make up a cloud infrastructure. Use CloudPlatform to deploy, manage, and configure cloud computing environments.
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Yes
Restfull API for the Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control, OVM Manager and OpenStack APIs on OVM Servers. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E64076_01/ and http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/toc.htm
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Extensions
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Cloud |
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Citrix Desktop Virtualization (XenDesktop & XenApp 7.6 - NEW; ViaB; associated products)
Citrix is by many perceived to own the most comprehensive portfolio for desktop virtualization alongside with the largest overall market share.
Citrixs success in this space is historically based on its Terminal Services-like capabilities (Hosted SHARED Desktops i.e. XenApp aka Presentation Server) but Citrix has over time added VDI (Hosted Virtual Desktops), mobility management (XenMobile), networking (NetScaler), cloud for Service Providers hosting desktop/apps (CloudPlatform) and other comprehensive capabilities to its portfolio (separate fee-based offerings).
Citrixs FlexCast approach promotes the any type of virtual desktop to any device philosophy and facilitates the use of different delivery technologies (e.g. VDI, application publishing or streaming, client hypervisor etc.) depending on the respective use case (so not a one fits all approach).
XenDesktop 7.x history:
- Citrixs announcement of Project Avalon in 2011 promised the integration of a unified desktop / application virtualization capability into its CloudPlatform product. This was then broken up into the Excalibur Project (unifying XenDesktop and XenApp in the XenDesktop 7.x product) and the Merlin Release aiming to provide multi-tenant clouds to manage virtual desktops and applications.
- XenDesktop 7.1 added support for Windows Server 2012 R2 and Windows 8.1, and new Studio configuration of server-based graphical processing units (GPUs) considered an essential hardware component for supporting virtualized delivery of 3D professional graphics applications.
- In Jan 2014 Citrix announced that XenApp is back as product name, rather than using XenDesktop to refer to VDI as well as desktop/application publishing capabilities, also see http://gtnr.it/14KYg4b
- With XenDesktop 7.5 Citrix announced the capability to provision application and or desktop workloads to public and or private cloud infrastructures (Citrix CloudPlatform, Amazon and (later) Windows Azure. Wake-on-LAN capability has been added to Remote PC Access and AppDNA is now included in the product.
-With XenDesktop 7.6 includes new features like: session prelaunch and session linger; support for unauthenticated (anonymous) users and connection leasing makes recently used applications and desktops available even when the Site database in unavailable.
VDI in a Box: Citrix also has VDI in a Box (ViaB) offering (originating in the Kaviza acquisition) - a simple to deploy, easy to manage and scale VDI solution targeting smaller deployments and limited use cases.
In reality ViaB box scales to larger (thousaunds of users) environments but has (due to its simplified nature and product positioning) restricted use cases compared to the full XenDesktop (There is no direct migration path between ViaB and XenDesktop). ViaB can for instance not provide advanced Hosted Shared Desktops (VDI only), no advanced graphics capabilities (HDX3DPro), has limited HA for fully persistent desktops, no inherent multi-site management capabilities.
Overview here: http://bit.ly/1fXeA38
Recommended Read for VDI Comparison (Ruben Spruijts VDI Smackdown): http://www.pqr.com/downloadformulier?file=VDI_Smackdown.pdf
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Oracle Enterprise Manager is capable of providing IaaS, PaaS and SaaS as well as Hybrid Cloud Management
The IaaS is provided via Oracle VM and PaaS/SaaS can also be provided on top of this IaaS Implementation, since Oracle Enterprise Manager aggregate those capabilities. For more info access http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/oem/cloud-mgmt-496758.html
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Desktop Virtualization |
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no
There is no specific Storage Virtualization appliance capability other than the abstraction of storage resources through the hypervisor.
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Not evaluated
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1 |
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Vendor Add-On: XenDesktop
EdgeSight, Director
The performance monitoring and trouble shooting aspect of Application Management in the context of Citrix is mostly applicable to XenDesktop 7 Director and XenDesktop 7 EdgeSight
- Desktop Director is a real-time web tool, used primarily for the Help Desk agents. In XenDesktop 7, Directors new troubleshooting dashboard provides the real-time health monitoring of your XenDesktop 7 site.
- In XenDesktop 7, EdgeSight provides two key features, performance management and network analysis.
With XenDesktop 7, Director (the real-time assessment and troubleshooting tool is included in all XenDesktop 7 editions.
The new EdgeSight features are included in both XenApp and XenDesktop Platinum editions entitlements however these features are based on the XenDesktop 7 platform. The environment must be XenDesktop 7 in order to leverage the new Director and EdgeSight features.
EdgeSight network analysis also requires NetScaler Enterprise or Platinum edition. With NetScaler Enterprise, real-time data for the last 60 minutes is provided. NetScaler Platinum edition has an unlimited data retention. To summarize,
How do you get it?
With XenDesktop 7, Director is included in all XenDesktop 7 editions. The new EdgeSight features are included in both XenApp and XenDesktop Platinum editions entitlements however these features are based on the XenDesktop 7 platform.
- All editions: Director - real-time monitoring and basic troubleshooting (up to 7 days of data)
- XD7 Platinum: EdgeSight performance management feature - includes #1 + historical monitoring (up to a full year of data through the monitoring SQL database)
- XD7 Platinum + NetScaler Enterprise: EdgeSight performance management and network analysis - includes #2 plus 60 mins. of network data
- XD7 Platinum + NetScaler Platinum: EdgeSight performance management and network analysis - includes #2 plus unlimited network data
http://bit.ly/17toPr8
Citrix EdgeSight is a performance and availability management suite for XenApp, Presentation Server, XenDesktop and endpoint systems (through agents running on physical systems or virtualized platforms). Citrix EdgeSight monitors applications, sessions, devices, and the network in real time. Details here: http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX124092
EdgeSight for NetScaler is an agent-less solution which provides real-time user performance monitoring specifically for web applications based upon actual user experience (response time). It provides both real-time and historical views to proactively identify potential problems. (Citrix NetScaler is an application switch - a physical or virtual appliance - that intelligently distributes, optimizes, and secures network traffic for Web applications. Features include load balancing, compression, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) offload, a built-in application firewall, and dynamic content caching.) Details here: http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX121310
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No
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2 |
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Application Management
Details
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Vendor Add-Ons: NetScaler Gateway, App Firewall, CloudBridge
NetScaler provides various (network) security related capabilities through e.g.
- NetScaler Gateway: secure application and data access for Citrix XenApp, Citrix XenDesktop and Citrix XenMobile)
- NetScaler AppFirewall: secures web applications, prevents inadvertent or intentional disclosure of confidential information and aids in compliance with information security regulations such as PCI-DSS. AppFirewall is available as a standalone security appliance or as a fully integrated module of the NetScaler application delivery solution and is included with Citrix NetScaler, Platinum Edition.
Details here: http://bit.ly/17ttmKk
CloudBridge:
Initially marketed under NetScaler CloudBridge, Citrix CloudBridge provides a unified platform that connects and accelerates applications, and optimizes bandwidth utilization across public cloud and private networks.
CloudBridge encrypts the connection between the enterprise premises and the cloud provider so that all data in transit is secure.
http://bit.ly/17ttSYA
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No
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3 |
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Workflow Studio (incl.)
Workflow Studio is included with this license and provides a graphical interface for workflow composition in order to reduce scripting. Workflow Studio allows administrators to tie technology components together via workflows. Workflow Studio is built on top of Windows® PowerShell and Windows Workflow Foundation. It natively supports Citrix products including XenApp, XenDesktop, XenServer and NetScaler.
Available as component of XenDesktop suite, Workflow Studio was retired in XenDesktop 7.x
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No
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4 |
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Workflow / Orchestration
Details
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Integrated Site Recovery (incl.)
XenServer 6 introduced the Integrated Site Recovery (maintained in 6.5), utilizing the native remote data replication between physical storage arrays and automates the recovery and failback capabilities. The new approach removes the Windows VM requirement for the StorageLink Gateway components and it works now with any iSCSI or Hardware HBA storage repository (rather only the restricted storage options with StorageLink support). You can perform failover, failback and test failover. You can configure and operate it using the Disaster Recovery option in XenCenter. Please note however that Site Recovery does NOT interact with the Storage array, so you will have to e.g. manually break mirror relationships before failing over. You will need to ensure that the virtual disks as well as the pool meta data (containing all the configuration data required to recreate your vims and vApps) are correctly replicated to your secondary site.
Note: Citrix strongly recommends using the XenServer 6.x Disaster Recovery feature, as the legacy Metadata Backup, Restore and Update mechanism (accessible via the XenServer host console) will be deprecated in a future XenServer release. Citrix advises customers using the legacy mechanism to migrate to the new, integrated feature. [CA-65906]
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control to create Self Service Portals with Workflows to provision VMs or to create Jobs to automate Manual Tasks. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/index.htm
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5 |
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Vendor Add-On: CloudPortal Business Manager, CloudStack Usage Server (Fee-Based Add-Ons)
Citrixs CloudPortal product line offers CloudPortal Business Manager - a business operations suite that works in conjunction with IAAS clouds running on Citrix CloudPlatform allowing to meter and automate billing and payment processing for services consumed within your cloud.
http://bit.ly/1w9309R
- Citrixs CloudStack contains usage server a separately-installed component that provides aggregated usage records which can be used to create billing integration for CloudStack metrics.
- Also , the workload balancing engine with XenServer 5.6 FP1 introduced support for simple chargeback and reporting. The chargeback report includes, amongst other data, the following: the name of the VM, and uptime as well as usage for storage, CPU, memory and network reads/writes. You can use the Chargeback Utilization Analysis report to determine what percentage of a resource (such as a physical server) a specific department within your organization used.
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Yes
If the Storage is Replicated the whole environment can be orchestrated to be up and running in minutes if the Failover Site already has the Oracle VM up and running pointing to the Replicated Storage with the help of Oracle Site Guard. More info on: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/server-storage/vm/ovm3-disaster-recovery-1872591.pdf
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6 |
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NetScaler Gateway, AppFirewall, Branch Repeater, 1000v, CloudBridge (Fee-Based Add-Ons)
Citrix has been greatly expanding its network related capabilities. They sit typically under the umbrella of the NetScaler family but frequent product name changes and repackaging makes it often difficult to keep track.
- NetScaler for SDN: unifying L4-7 network services into an application control layer and integrating this application control with existing transport networks and emerging software defined network (SDN) technologies
- NetScaler Gateway (formerly Access Gateway): secure (VPN) application and data access for Citrix XenApp, Citrix XenDesktop and Citrix XenMobile
- NetScaler Branch Repeater: WAN optimization solution that accelerates, controls and optimizes desktops, applications, multimedia for branch and mobile users (Branch Repeater is merging with the Citrix CloudBridge product family)
- NetScaler AppFirewall: secures web applications, prevents inadvertent or intentional disclosure of confidential information and aids in compliance with information security regulations such as PCI-DSS. AppFirewall is available as a standalone security appliance or as a fully integrated module of the NetScaler application delivery solution and is included with Citrix NetScaler, Platinum Edition.
- NetScaler 1000V: NetScaler is engineered to seamlessly and uniquely integrate with the core Nexus 7000 and the virtual Nexus 1000V fabrics.
NetScaler is available as physical appliance and software-based virtual appliances in a range of editions:
- NetScaler MPX appliances are physical network appliances that offer up to 120 Gbps performance.
- NetScaler SDX is a high-density consolidation platform that combines Xen-based virtualization with the architecture of NetScaler MPX to run up to 40 NetScaler instances simultaneously
- NetScaler VPX virtual appliances run as virtual machines (VMs)
Editions available include Standard, Enterprise and Platinum.
http://bit.ly/17twoy5
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Yes
Oracle offers Oracle Enterprise Manager 13c Cloud Control for Chargeback. More info on: http://docs.oracle.com/cd/E73210_01/EMCLO/GUID-918D7707-BE04-4E00-8EF1-C4E5BD66CE73.htm
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7 |
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Network Extensions
Details
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No
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