Virtualisation to cut server sales growth

IDC predicts slowdown, while Suse offers Linux guest support

The trend towards server virtualisation is set to have a huge impact on hardware purchasing, according to a leading market researcher.

IDC has updated its forecasts to predict that server shipments will only grow by 39 percent by 2010, rather than 61 percent. The firm said that multicore x86 processors from Intel and AMD are also reducing the need for purchasing systems.

“Unlike other previous multicore introductions that took time to become mainstream as customers changed their application code, virtualisation allows customers to fully exploit their investments in x86 processors immediately,” said Michelle Bailey, IDC vice-president, in a statement.

Red Hat’s release of its Linux distribution with integrated virtualisation has begun a wave of activity from other distributors.

At its Brainshare conference in Salt Lake City last week, Novell issued a public beta of the first service pack for Suse Linux Enterprise 10. The SP1 release ups the virtualisation ante by packaging the Xen hypervisor 3.0.4 version, whereas Red Hat included the 3.0.3 release.

Also, while Red Hat has positioned RHEL 5 as a release aimed at virtualising Linux, Novell said that new network and block device drivers will allow Windows Server 2000, 2003 and XP to run unmodified under Suse. That change supplements a recently-added capability that also lets Suse run other Linux distributions unmodified. As well as the server, the SP1 release also includes a Linux desktop that supports virtualisation.

Novell technical director Brian Green said the company is pursuing interoperability.

“We want to ensure we can virtualise and support not only Suse Linux or competitors’ [Linux distributions], and the latest step is to run Windows unmodified on Xen,” Green said. “It will give us a competitive edge.”

Interoperability will be extended to include support for managing VMware and the forthcoming “Viridian” Microsoft hypervisor through Novell’s ZenWorks management console, Green added.

General availability is scheduled to arrive by July, together with other SP1 enhancements for high-performance computing, security, interoperability and systems management.

Experts suggest the SP1 release could give Suse an advantage over Red Hat on virtualisation.

“RHEL 5 will package Xen 3.0.3, which has [Intel and AMD virtualisation] support but uses emulated I/O, so Windows runs, but very, very slowly,” said Simon Crosby, chief technology officer of ZenSource. “Suse Linux Enterprise SP1 will package Xen 3.0.4, which in addition supports high-speed paravirtualised I/O for [Intel and AMD guests], so Windows, with the addition of third-party drivers, can run very fast.”

Crosby added that Intel’s help in developing drivers will be particularly valuable.

Separately, Oracle plans to complete testing of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 imminently for its Unbreakable Linux support service. In a 16 March forum response the firm said it would “take another few weeks to ensure stability, robustness and interoperability”.

Microsoft is still planning its Viridian virtualisation hypervisor to appear within 180 days of the next version of Windows Server, codenamed Longhorn and expected to appear towards the end of this year.

The firm also plans to have its System Centre Virtual Machine Manager software available later this year, or early in 2008.