Queries the following Comparison is trying to Answer:
VMware Virtual
Infrastructure 3 VS Citrix Xen Server Enterprise
How does Citrix Xen Server Enterprise
compare to VMware VI3?
Advantages & Disadvantages of Xen Server
Enterprise & VMware VI3
What is better VMware VI3 or Citrix Xen
Server Enterprise? How?
Independent Unbiased Comparison Citrix Xen
Server Enterprise & VMware VI3
VMware VI3
VS Citrix Xen Server Enterprise Introduction:
Ok, decided on riding
the virtualization boat and confused on the right product for your company.
You are in the correct place as here we list the comparisons of most of the
virtualization solutions. On this page we will compare the Xen Enterprise & VMware Virtual Infrastructure 3, but other comparisons are
available and you can choose them from the menu on the left panel. Below is
our unbiased comparison, but we still offer the some what biased comparisons
which we has found at the links below
Xen Enterprise VS VMware Virtual Infrastructure
3 (Xen Biased)
Xen Enterprise VS VMware Virtual Infrastructure
3 (VMware Biased)
|
VMware/EMC |
Xen |
URL |
Vmware.com |
xensource.com |
ITComparison Comments |
VMware site is a bit easier to guess
the name of it and browse in regards of virtualization than Xen site. |
Product Name |
Infrstructure v3 (Starter, Standard, and Enterprise) |
Xen (Express, Server, Enterprise) |
ITComparison Comments |
Both are doing as good in
regards of their naming convention. |
Pricing range |
$1000 - $5750 |
Free
-
|
ITComparison Comments |
This can really be misleading as VMware VI3
you can run a bit more virtual machines on the same specs machine then Xen
which make the cost per Virtual Machine almost the same. Never let the
initial price fool you.
|
Primary usage |
Production Environment |
Testing &
Development
Environment |
ITComparison Comments |
Xen
is mostly implemented in testing and
development
environment in the enterprise today, as it has
not been long enough for it to be fully tested comparing to
VMware which are mature
enough for production environment.
|
Required Host
OS (if any) |
Infra
v3:Bare-Metal |
Xen: Bare-Metal |
ITComparison Comments
-: Citrix Xen Enterprise server VS VMware VI3 :- |
VMware bare-metal
installation harden the security of its product and
make it independent of
any operating system security risks and
breaches specially in the 3i version, unlike the
Xen installation which almost include a full Linux kernal. Therefore Xen
will still be affected by Linux bugs and security holes although there not
many out there, but still can be of concern to larger enterprise.
|
Management tools |
Virtual Center |
|
ITComparison Comments |
Xen has just released their XenCenter
Administrator. Its not as rich as the VMware Virtual Center features wise
as its still in its early days, but it do what it meant for and improving
quite fast.
|
Support resources |
High |
Medium |
ITComparison Comments |
VMware has been in the market
longer, which gave it the chance to build a huge dedicated
professional support. On the other hand Xen are getting the advantage of
the Open Source Community backing up their support team. |
Supported Guest OS |
- Microsoft WindowsNT4.0
/2000/2003/XP/Vista
- Red Hat Enterprise 2.1/3/4
/5
- Red Hat Linux Advanced Server 2.1
- Redhat Linux 7.2/7.3/8.0
/9.0
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
8/9/10
- SUSE Linux 8.2/9.0/9.1/9.2
/9.3
-FreeBSD
4.9/4.10/4.11
- NetWare
6.5/6.0/5.1
- Solaris 10 for
X86
- Vista
(Experimental
Support)
- Windows 2008
Beta (Experimental Support)
- Windows 2003
Standard /Enterprise SP1/SP2/R2
64-bit + Virtual
SMP (Supported
in Production)
|
•
64-bit
o Windows
Server 2003 Web, Standard, Enterprise, Datacenter SP2
32-bit
o Windows Server 2003 Web,
Standard, Enterprise, Datacenter SP0/ SP1/SP2/R2
o Windows XP SP2
o Windows 2000 SP4
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux
(and derivatives (32-bit)): 3.5, 3.6, 3.7, 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, 4.4, 5
- Novell SUSE Linux
Enterprise Server(32-bit): 9SP2, 9SP3, 10SP1
- Debian(32-bit): Sarge
(3.1), Etch (4.0)
|
ITComparison Comments |
Its obvious that VMware has production
support for more OS
than Xen. In addition, Xen requires
modification of these OS to be able to perform well. In addition Xen
require Intel-VT or AMD-V to be able to run windows platform.
|
Performance |
- Higher
Performance
- More virtual
Machines per hardware |
- Almost as high performance in
most of our benchmarks for Linux.
- A bit slower performance for
Windows. |
ITComparison
Comments |
Xen is highly depend on Paravirtualization in improving performance
and windows are still not Paravirtualization ready yet which is the main
reason for lack of performance for guests running windows OS, but
Microsoft will be going into that direction starting with Windows 2008
|
64-bit
Support |
Has full support for most of the 64-bit
Operating Systems. |
Has full support for 64-bit version of Windows
Server 2003 Web, Standard, Enterprise, Datacenter SP2 |
ITComparison Comments |
Both offers 64-bit Guest OS
support. |
Live Migration
(VMotion/XenMotion)
High Availability
(HA)
Dynamic Resources
(DRS) |
Supported Supported
Supported |
Supported Not Supported
Not Supported |
ITComparison
Comments |
Xen has implemented XenMotion,
which is the equivelent of VMware VMotion and seems to perform as well.
HA & DRS
are great features that VMware came up with
and Xen still does not offer any equivalence as it highly reduce downtime,
and balance resources they are still a great advantage of VMware. |
Max
# of CPUs per Virtual Machine
Max Memory per Virtual Machine
Max Memory per Host |
4
Processors
16GB
64GB |
8
Processors
32GB
128GB |
ITComparison
Comments |
Seems Xen has beaten VMware to
this one. |
Unmodified OS |
Can run all supported Operating Systems
without being modified |
Linux will required to be modified through inclusion of Xen Hypervisor
Windows (Require Hardware
Assist). |
ITComparison
Comments |
For Xen to perform near to VMware it need
to modify the OS by inclusion of Xen Hypervisor and for windows they are
waiting for Microsoft to introduce this concept in their windows 2008.
This give a clear advantage to VMware at the moment, but can be a nice
integration in the future. |
HotAdd
CPU in Linux Virtual Machines |
Not supported |
Supported |
ITComparison
Comments |
Nice feature, but the affect
of it can be matched by changing the share value for the CPU in VMware for
both Windows and Linux |
Virtualization Approach |
emulation and binary translation |
paravirtualization |
ITComparison
Comments
-: Citrix Xen Enterprise server VS VMware
VI3:- |
Xen depends on
Paravirtualization which requires OS modification by vendor to improve
performance by totally forwarding the modified OS instructions directly
to the Hardware.
VMware
depends on emulation and binary translation which does not require any OS
modificaiton and emulate the virtual machines commands. |
Special Hardware Requirement |
Require supported SCSI or SATA controllers. |
Require Intel-VT or AMD-V |
ITComparison
Comments |
SCSI & SATA controllers has been native to most
Intel & AMD servers for a quite bit of time, but Intel-VT and AMD-V are only supported
in newer server and will force implementer of Xen to buy newer server,
even if they have enough resource on the old one. |
Other Related Comparisons:
VMware ESX 4
vs MS Hyper-V R2
Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2
VS Citrix Xen Enterprise
Microsoft
Virtual Server 2005 R2
VS VMware Virtual Infrastructure 3
Microsoft Windows Hyper-V
(WSV)
VS VMware Virtual
Infrastructure 3.5
Virtualization
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