We've been running a production ESXi host for about a year and half now and its been rock solid. Our kaseya server has only been running on it for about 2 weeks (just hit 650 agents) and we have 5 other servers running on it as well. We also tested VMware utility for converting physical machines to virtual and it worked great, we've done two servers that way and they've been running reliably as VMs for about 6 months now.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: roadrunner2348

We've Been using kaseya 5 in a virtual environment since we started (about 2 years now), and we've already built the infrastructure and machines for running K2. It's worked great for us. We're running VMWare ESXi

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: rbjsea

Thanks for all the feedback guys!

I do get the MS Action Pack too, so I know I could use HyperV without shelling out any more money. Then again, I could use ESXi too since it's free.

I'll watch this thread a little longer and see if there's any consensus on HyperV vs ESXi...

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: ReedMikel

FrankieBoy

Well ReedMikel the simple answer to one of your questions, why i chose to use Hyper-V over VMware?, if you subscribe to Microsofts Action Pack you get all your software virtually free, as long as it is for your own use (business needs).

so i run Server 2008 IIS7 and SQL 2008 and only cost me 250 english pounds...lol and all the other MS products i care to use within the lisences they allocate for each product.

Works great for me, hope this helps.

From what I was told by my Microsoft regional sales person is I could not use the Action Pack the way you are describing and I ended up purchasing the needed software. Can anyone verify that they have been told different by Microsoft since I am not a lawyer.

That aside, Hyper V Server 2008 R2 is FREE now. To qoute Microsoft's website:

"Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 will be available as a free download. CALs are only required for Windows Server and all Windows Server images that are virtualized, regardless of virtualization platform. No CALs are required for Microsoft Hyper-V Server"

The Hyper V Server 2008 is not the Hyper V that is part of 2008 and runs as its own operating system simliar to VMWare ESXi.

Hyper V Server website: http://www.microsoft.com/hyper-v-server/en/us/default.aspx
---

Licensing information:
https://partner.microsoft.com/US/program/managemembership/actionpack/mapslicensing

Software Usage Rights
The Microsoft Action Pack software is for internal business use and not for distribution (NFD). You may use MAPS software to run your own business and for evaluation, demonstration, testing, training, and education. For example, you can use MAPS software to host your company’s intranet.

MAPS software is not provided for personal use, for hosting customer applications, or for installation at a customer site. For example, you cannot use MAPS software to host a commercial website; this is considered a production environment outside the scope of the software’s intended purpose.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: Chris T

I did not know that there was a Hyper V Server 2008 that is its own os - thanks for that info. But now it's getting even more confusing

Chris T

The Hyper V Server 2008 is not the Hyper V that is part of 2008 and runs as its own operating system simliar to VMWare ESXi.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: ReedMikel

ReedMikel

I did not know that there was a Hyper V Server 2008 that is its own os - thanks for that info. But now it's getting even more confusing

I know. I use it for my test server since the requirements were not as a picky as VMWare ESXi was at the time. For production I plan on the VMWare ESXi.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: Chris T

Just wanted to let everyone know. You can get the vmWare Licenses for FREE if you signup for vmware's partner program. We have about 100k worth of vmware software which we got for Internal Use free with our partner program.

http://www.vmware.com/partners/programs/solution-provider/benefits.html

also, they will offer free certification training for sales and pre-sales engineer which you can take online to learn their productline. Well worth the time spent if you want to embrase the whole virtualzation rush going on.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: chimoe

Thanks chimoe!

chimoe

Just wanted to let everyone know. You can get the vmWare Licenses for FREE if you signup for vmware's partner program. We have about 100k worth of vmware software which we got for Internal Use free with our partner program.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: ReedMikel

You may want to check with the respective vendors.

Supposedly Action Pack software cannot be used for Kaseya as all use is to be on your own premises and the agents checking in violate this as you are running a public facing web server/SQL backend.

It doesn't make sense to me as you are just dogfooding MS products and can show clients what you can do with the stuff.

Don't know about VMWare, they tend not to be so stuffy.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: smbtechnology

I'd need a team of lawyers to decipher the Microsoft terms

smbtechnology

You may want to check with the respective vendors.

Supposedly Action Pack software cannot be used for Kaseya as all use is to be on your own premises and the agents checking in violate this as you are running a public facing web server/SQL backend.

It doesn't make sense to me as you are just dogfooding MS products and can show clients what you can do with the stuff.

Don't know about VMWare, they tend not to be so stuffy.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: ReedMikel

I have a Dell R710 with 12 GB RAM, 4 TB disk, and dual quad core procs.
This machine is currently hosting 4 virtual servers plus the host. One of them is the Kaseya server. It does an excellent job.

Personally, I think everything other than Exchange and large SQL installations should be virtualized.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: QLTPLS

I run it on ESXi 3.5. I'm about to move it over to a ESXi 4 box.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: JointTech

chimoe

Just wanted to let everyone know. You can get the vmWare Licenses for FREE if you signup for vmware's partner program. We have about 100k worth of vmware software which we got for Internal Use free with our partner program.

http://www.vmware.com/partners/programs/solution-provider/benefits.html

also, they will offer free certification training for sales and pre-sales engineer which you can take online to learn their productline. Well worth the time spent if you want to embrase the whole virtualzation rush going on.

Hey and If you tell them you are from Rwanda you can get it for free Pro version for developing nations) instead of the $250 signup. (which is less than Action pack iirc)

But the $250 would be worth it for vmotion. thats the one thing I miss with the free version of ESX.
Also VMWare Workstation 7 is awesome for testing. Im half way into a trial and may actually buy it. I can run my Eve-Online game inside it with no problem. Never seen any virtualization that could do that.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: JointTech

Why shouldn't Exchange be virtualized? Or is that more a Hyper V limitation?

QLTPLS

Personally, I think everything other than Exchange and large SQL installations should be virtualized.

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: ReedMikel

We have been running K2 in a Xen environment with a dedicated SQL server since K2 was released as beta to us a few months back. The NIC I/O is the largest issue you have to deal with. The CPU/Memory usage is nothing to worry about. We have over 900 agents checking in and the data between the SQL and KServer run an constant 3Mb to 4Mb with no issues. Also even though we only have 6 engineers "using" the system for administration purposes, we have around 40 clients that use it as a remote desktop tool.

I have never been a fan of Hyper-V and VMWare has always seemed a little sluggish to me. You should try Xen.

Marty

Legacy Forum Name: General Discussion,
Legacy Posted By Username: Missing Link