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Release: Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0

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Veeam Software, provider of systems management tools for VMware virtual datacenter environments, today announced version 4.0 of Veeam Backup & Replication, a backup solution for VMware environments.

With version 4.0, Veeam will be the first to support new VMware vSphere 4 vStorage technology. With this new release, Veeam extends its leadership in the VMware backup market with the most innovative features and the most customer value. Backup & Replication 4.0 will be demonstrated in Veeam’s booth, #1202, at VMworld 2009 in San Francisco next week.

Only Veeam Backup & Replication offers full native support for new VMware vSphere functionality, and version 4.0 takes full advantage of the VMware vStorage API. This includes:

  • Support for thin-provisioned disks, which enables faster full backups and restore of virtual machines
  • The ability to leverage ESX4 changed block tracking for much faster incremental backups
  • Support for virtual applications (vApp), resulting in more flexibility when setting up backup jobs

The vStorage API is a VMware Consolidated Backup (VCB) replacement that enables local area network-free backups directly from storage area network (SAN) storage, without affecting an organization’s production ESX or ESXi hosts.

Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0 also includes a new Enterprise Management Server that enables enterprise customers to manage multiple installations of Veeam Backup & Replication through a single web console. This allows customers to centralize backup and decentralize restore processes according to their administrative, business, geographical, and security requirements and boundaries. Native support for this distributed architecture offers the ability to easily scale VMware backup infrastructure as the virtual environment grows, while also providing centralized management and reporting capabilities.

Additional new features in Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0 include:

  • Near real-time replication leveraging new vSphere ESX4 functionality to provide five-minute increments to achieve better recovery point objectives (RPOs)
  • Hot VM copy capability to mirror production environments to test lab storage, for datacenter migrations or for ad-hoc backups
  • Backup storage space monitoring with alerts for advanced backup storage capacity planning
  • Replica seeding for the initial replication using removable storage to minimize traffic over WAN

Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0 is expected to be generally available in early October. North American pricing for the new version starts at $599 per socket, but the previous version’s price of $499 per socket will be honored on orders placed by Dec. 31, 2009.

Release: Leostream Connection Broker 6.2

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Leostream just released an update to its VDI connection broker.  The company focused on adding support for Citrix in the last major update, and now, with this release, they’ve focused on support for Microsoft technologies.

Features of the Leostream Connection Broker 6.2 include:

Installation & Management

  • Easy installation as a virtual application: Connection Broker 6.2 virtual application provides native installation on a Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V or Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 hypervisor;
  • Native support for Hyper-v based virtual machines: Simplified discovery and machine power control.

End-user Experience Pack – Connection Broker provides a complete set of features to create an optimal end-user experience with Microsoft desktop virtualization software, including:

  • Windows 7 support: Full support for Microsoft’s new Windows 7 operating system;
  • RDP 7 support: Full support for the new remote desktop protocol (RDP) 7, with its high-performance enhancements such as bi-directional audio and rich graphics;
  • Multimonitor support: Leostream supports multiple monitors with RDP and a wide range of additional protocols;
  • USB management: USB pass-through policies allow administrators to manage classes of devices or individual devices, depending on need. USB policies can be combined with other Leostream policies, such as location-based ones, to support the exact implementation of business rules;
  • Location-based printing: Administrators can specify a list of network printers to connect to a particular group of clients based on their location. End-users can select local printers when connected to remote desktops;
  • Single Sign On for RDP: Provides seamless access to all versions of Windows virtual desktops from any client device, including Windows 2000, 2003, XP, Vista, and RDP 7;
  • User profile support: Consistently offers the same desktop to the user who travels or changes physical location;
  • Extensive flexibility in assigning users to resources such as desktops, applications and sessions: Leostream’s powerful policy capabilities are natively available in Microsoft environments.

Release: VMLogix LabManager 3.8

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VMLogix today announced the newest version of their flagship product, VMLogix LabManager 3.8.

The new release adds capabilities for network policy configurations and deployment within IP zones across multiple virtual hosts. This release also adds support for VMware vSphere 4 virtualization infrastructure and integration with VMware vCenter Server, formally VMware VirtualCenter, as well as extended support for Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2.

VMLogix LabManager allows development, test and support teams to build, snapshot, share and deploy production-like environments on-demand across virtualization platforms. With LabManager, customers can consolidate and automate lab IT infrastructure in order to deliver and maintain software applications more quickly, cost-effectively and reliably. Companies can dramatically reduce the manual effort, time and IT resources required to develop and maintain higher quality software applications by using comprehensive automation capabilities, advanced team management and seamless integrations with leading solutions from HP and IBM.

New features of VMLogix LabManager 3.8 include:

  • Support for VMware vCenter Server 4.0 and VMware vSphere: integrating with VMware vCenter Server 4.0, LabManager supports a lab with VMware vSphere or VMware Virtual Infrastructure 3 hypervisors on the virtual hosts. The support for vCenter Server in LabManager allows administrators to benefit from platform management capabilities such as vMotion, DRS, HA and resource pools.
  • Updated support for Microsoft Hyper-V (Windows Server 2008 R2): extending platform support functionality, taking advantage of Hyper-V R2’s new shared cluster capability.
  • Network policies in configurations: allowing users to set custom firewall rules on the soft router in a configuration that allows virtual machines from within a LabManager configuration to connect to external IP addresses, outbound and inbound.
  • IP zones across multiple hosts: enabling IP-zoned LabManager configurations to be deployed across multiple virtual hosts.

VMLogix LabManager 3.8 is now generally available.

Parallels Debuts Switch to Mac Bundle

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Parallels today unveiled a complete solution designed to simplify the process of “switching” from a PC to Mac. Parallels Desktop Switch to Mac Edition empowers users to effortlessly make the move to Mac without the risk of losing familiar and important data and applications on their Microsoft Windows-based PCs.

The product combines a set of easy-to-use tools and interactive tutorials with Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac to help “Switchers” understand how to operate Mac OS X, transfer all PC data and applications, and seamlessly run their Windows applications on their new Macs.

Switching from PC to Mac is on the rise: analyst reports on operating system market share show that Mac OS X market growth comes at the expense of Windows’ market share. While the overall PC industry saw declines of 3% for the quarter ending in June 2009, Apple sales were up 4% year over year. According to Apple’s Q309 report, half of the Macs sold were to customers who had never owned a Mac before.

Parallels Desktop Switch to Mac Edition is an industry-first solution that addresses the challenges facing prospective PC-to-Mac Switchers:

  • Learning Mac OS X — The Switch to Mac learning tools are designed to specifically address any questions or concerns associated with the transition from Windows to Mac. More than two hours of interactive video tutorials help users learn the new interface and functionality of the Mac platform step-by-step, starting with the Mac equivalent of tasks performed on Windows. A quick reference card identifies the most common Windows and Mac command/function differences and puts the correct keystrokes at users’ fingertips.
  • Making the Move — Also important to new Mac users is getting files and media from their old computer to their Mac. Parallels recognizes that many people need help with this process, and developed a “plug and click” method that moves the entire PC (licensed operating system, applications, files and data) to the new Mac. This includes the Parallels High Speed USB Transfer Cable that connects the two machines and the Enhanced Parallels Transporter: simple, wizard-driven software that walks the user through the move in a few easy clicks. The seamless Mac user experience now starts on the PC side.
  • Running Windows and Mac side-by-side — Parallels Desktop Switch to Mac Edition includes Parallels Desktop for Mac 4.0, the number one Mac system utility, currently used by more than two million people to run Windows side-by-side with Mac applications. This award-winning virtualization software provides a fully integrated seamless experience, offering users the greatest stability and performance available for running Windows on a Mac, as recognized in 3rd party industry benchmarks³. Parallels Desktop 4.0 for Mac incorporates a range of security, backup and power saving features to give Mac users the easiest way to run Windows on a Mac.

Parallels Desktop 4.0 Switch to Mac Edition is available from today at Apple stores, at Apple.com and through other preferred retail partners in English, German and French. The suggested retail price (SRP) of the product is $99.99.

VirtenSys Introduces Its Flagship I/O Virtualization Switches

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VirtenSys has announced the general availability of its flagship I/O virtualization switches, the VirtenSys VIO 4000 Series based on its Virtual Connectivity Cloud platform.

With this announcement, VirtenSys became the first company to release production units of I/O virtualization switches based on PCI Express standards. The VIO 4000 switches are the first products on the market to consolidate, virtualize and share the major types of server networking and storage connectivity, including Ethernet, Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE), SAS/SATA, and Fibre Channel, without requiring any changes be made to the servers, networks, or I/O adapters. The switches are available through the VirtenSys worldwide partner network, and the products’ full capabilities will be demonstrated at VMworld 2009, booth #2231, in San Francisco, Calif.

The VIO 4000 switches reduce rack and blade server management complexity and costs by more than 60 percent, improve I/O utilization to greater than 80 percent, deliver full connectivity bandwidth to servers, halve equipment cost, and reduce I/O power consumption by more than 60 percent. This results in providing servers with the best price/performance and lowest energy consumption for accessing not only the local area networks (LAN), but also the storage infrastructures, including direct-attached storage (DAS) and storage area networks (SAN).

PrimaCloud Taps Xsigo I/O Director For Cloud Strategy

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PrimaCloud announced today that it has deployed the Xsigo I/O Director as the foundation of its data center interconnect strategy.

The Xsigo I/O Director enables PrimaCloud to break the barriers of I/O throughput seen in existing cloud computing offerings, allowing end customers to experience application performance levels that would previously have been achievable only in purpose-built private datacenters. Additionally, Xsigo’s virtual I/O infrastructure allows PrimaCloud to automatically provision cost-effective virtual private datacenters for its customers within minutes.

With three years of experience providing cloud computing under the ENKI name, PrimaCloud management was seeing an increasing number of enterprise clients running database and transaction-intensive applications — such as Oracle — which required multi-gigabit connections to the vLAN and NAS storage to avoid I/O contention. In these applications the bandwidth required per virtual machine exceeded 3Gb/sec, which meant that a single cloud server running ten virtual machines required over 30Gb/sec total I/O bandwidth. Only Xsigo virtual I/O, with dual redundant 20Gb/sec I/O connections per server, provided the required performance. The Xsigo I/O Director’s low-latency bandwidth also serves to take maximum advantage of PrimaCloud’s SSD-cached NAS systems to delivery outstanding application throughput.

PrimaCloud’s automatically managed, hypervisor-agnostic cloud architecture requires a high level of automation to create and manage virtual private datacenters (VPDCs). The Xsigo I/O Director is able to automatically provision and manage virtual I/O and VLANs associated with virtual instances running VMWare ESX, Citrix, HyperV, and 3Tera’s AppLogic, under the control of PrimaCloud’s implementation of Enigmatec’s EMS, a cross-platform, policy-based automation engine. Using EMS to configure the I/O Director eliminates manual labor in managing VPDCs, as well as permitting automatic scaling of VPDCs to respond to changes in load, resulting in significant end-customer cost savings.

Xsigo virtual I/O is a critical element of the reference datacenter architecture PrimaCloud uses to deliver on the promise of cloud computing: cost-effective, on-demand computing delivered on a pay-as-you-go-basis while meeting enterprise requirements for performance and uptime. The simplicity of deploying Xsigo Virtual I/O has enabled PrimaCloud’s reference architecture to be deployed in any one of its 65 datacenters worldwide for public, or hosted private cloud computing, as well as at customer sites.