Hyper-V beta is here .... early
So the big news at the end of last week was that the Microsoft Hyper-V beta is out and publically available with Windows Server 2008 RC1 .... nearly 2 months early.
You can get full details surrounding the release here https://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/default.mspx
or you can go straight to download the x64 Hyper-V bits here:
Here's a few highlights:
1. Quick Migration and high availability providing solutions for planned and unplanned downtime
2. Support for running Hyper-V with Server Core in the parent partition
3. Import/Export of virtual machines
4. Hyper-V now integrated with Windows Server Manager
5. Integration components are now included in Windows Server 2008 meaning that when you install Windows Server 2008 in a Hyper-V virtual machine, Windows will automatically install the ICs.
6. VHD Tools support (compaction, expansion and inspection)
7. Emulated video card has changed from an S3 Trio video card to a more generic VESA compatible device. (This change resolves numerous video issues with non-Windows operating systems like Linux).
8. Support for up to four virtual SCSI controllers per virtual machine
9. Numerous fixes for compatibility, performance and scalability
I ran it up on my little Dell D820 over the weekend and it really flys .... performance is awesome.
Just put it on my Dell Precision 490 today and it is very cool. Now to run up a few decent VMs...