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LeCroy Announces I/O Virtualization Support In The PCI Express Summit Protocol Analyzer

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LeCroy Corporation, a supplier of oscilloscopes and serial data test solutions, announced today a new analysis package for its Summit T2-16 Protocol Analyzer that will support testing and debugging in I/O virtualization-based applications.

LeCroy

LeCroy aims to support the new industry Single-Root I/O Virtualization standard (SR-IOV 1.0) and the Multi-Root I/O Virtualization standard (MR-IOV). Both technologies are PCI-SIG workgroup extensions to the PCI Express standard that make it possible for a single PCI Express system to behave simultaneously as several different machines using shared hardware.

The industry is developing this technology for several reasons, including an increase in cores per socket, reducing network costs, increasing system resiliency, and eliminating redundancy in peripherals and ports across network infrastructures.

“Virtualization is a key trend in enterprise, and the PCI-SIG’s Single-Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV) technology nicely complements Intel’s own Directed I/O (VT-d) technology in providing higher performance I/O for virtualized systems,” said Jim Pappas, Director of Initiative Marketing for Intel Corporation. “Tools such as the PCI Express I/O Virtualization analysis package from LeCroy will help companies reduce the complexity of development.”

LeCroy protocol analyzers have been at the forefront of PCI Express development. All LeCroy protocol analyzers feature a hierarchical display, real-time statistics, protocol traffic summaries, detailed error reports, powerful scripting, and the ability to create user-defined test reports which allow developers to troubleshoot intricate problems and finish their projects on time.

[Source: Businesswire]

VMware Releases Upgraded Virtual Disk Development Kit 1.0

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Recently, VMware quietly released version 1.0 of its Virtual Disk Development Kit, a collection of C libraries, code samples, utilities, and documentation to help you create or access VMware virtual disk storage.

VMware

The release notes tell us this enables a wide range of solutions, including:

  • Creation of virtual machine disk files to store backup of physical images.
  • Read access to virtual disk to enable off-line centralized scanning of virtual machines for anti-virus.
  • Write access to virtual disk to enable off-line centralized patching of virtual machines.
  • Read access to virtual disk to enable off-line software package analysis of virtual machines.

    • The new API supports managing two kinds of disks; Managed Disks (local virtual diskfiles) and Hosted Disk (virtual disk files on you ESX/VMFS systems). This means the API will allow you to access disks remotely and opens a low of new opportunities for companies making virus scanning software, backup, forensic, etc.

    To obtain the software, navigate to the VMware Developer Center and under the heading SDKs and APIs, click Virtual Disk. For download you will need to provide your email address and registered password.

    The relevant VMware Community can be found here.

    [Source: Run-Virtual]

    Ars Technica Directions Symposium – Virtualization And Server Consolidation

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    The great tech blog Ars Technica announced about two weeks ago that it would host a brand new community program in collaboration with Intel, dubbed ‘Directions: a Web Symposium’.

    This week’s topic of the Directions Symposium is centered around virtualization and server consolidation. Intel has rounded up ten of their top virtualization experts, including a few Intel Principal Engineers, for participation in the new round of conversations.

    Jump in if you’re interested!

    HP Updates HP-UX, Introduces Four New Operating Environments

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    We missed this last week, but HP announcing four new operating environments (OEs) with the latest release of HP-UX 11i v3, Update 2, was just too big a deal not to cover.

    HP

    Designed to simplify UNIX deployments on HP Integrity servers, the new OEs enable customers to reduce costs and accelerate time to solution for immediate out-of-the-box productivity. They deliver fully integrated UNIX virtualization and high availability features, as well as a full range of HP software, with the HP-UX 11i operating system, in a single package.

    Users don’t have to buy the pre-packaged deals; they can just buy the OS and then add middleware products à la carte. But HP claims customers can save money by purchasing the packaged deals, as well as the time in not having to buy and install each separate feature they want.

    With the new update, the operating environments include Base, High Availability, Virtual Server, and Data Center. High-Availability and Virtual Server both have everything Base has, but with unique features to one another. High-Availability, for example, has HP Serviceguard, software that helps clustered server environments prevent downtime. The Virtual Server OE, meanwhile, has Virtual Server Environment, HP’s virtualization environment for its Unix servers.

    The latest release of HP-UX 11i v3 Update 2 also delivers improved performance. According to HP’s announcement, customers can achieve up to a 100 % increase in network speed, as well as continued acceleration of the mass storage stack, which controls I/O devices such as SCSI logical units. In addition, Update 2 simplifies blade management and consolidation while advancing multi-OS usability. The new release facilitates upgrades by enabling virtual partitions on v3 to combine HP-UX 11i v1, v2 with v3 on a single machine.

    [Source: SearchDataCenter.com]

    Egenera BladeFrame Systems Now Come With VMware Virtualization

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    Egenera today announced the general availability of VMware virtualization on Egenera systems with full support from Egenera and its resellers. Under the companies’ original equipment manufacturing (OEM) agreement announced in 2007, customers can purchase VMware Infrastructure 3 with the Egenera BladeFrame system, a platform designed to support large-scale virtualized deployments of critical applications with high levels of availability and scalability.

    Egenera

    The Egenera BladeFrame system combines diskless server blades with PAN Manager software, an infrastructure virtualization product that virtualizes data center infrastructure and delivers a highly available, flexible computing platform. Using VMware virtualization, customers can create and run virtual machines on the BladeFrame system to partition Egenera Processing Blade modules and run multiple OS’s and applications on a single blade.

    “VMware and Egenera offer complementary technologies. We’re pleased that customers can now deploy VMware virtualization on the BladeFrame platform with the peace of mind that their investments are fully supported by Egenera,” said Brian Byun, vice president of global partners and solutions, VMware, Inc. “As our relationship grows, we see additional areas for collaboration in managing both physical and virtual assets. We hope to further extend the business value of VMware virtualization and continue providing joint solutions that enable customers to reduce operating expenses, improve business continuity, strengthen security and go green.”

    Egenera recently inked an OEM deal with Dell. Dell has agreed to resell and ship Egenera’s Processing Area Network (PAN) Manager I/O virtualization software on its PowerEdge servers by June of this year.

    [Source: Marketwire]

    Pano Logic Expands Virtualization Offering, Adds Support for WAN And VMware Virtual Desktop Manager (VDM)

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    Startup Pano Logic today announced a major new software release for its desktop virtualization solution. By leveraging existing virtual infrastructure and integrating hardware at the desktop with software in the data center, Pano Logic aims to provide the most complete and easiest-to-use virtual desktop solution on the market.

    Pano Logic

    The new release, Pano Virtual Desktop Solution (VDS) 2.0, can be deployed in new environments and network topologies, providing support for wide area network (WAN) deployments, dual monitor requirements, and offering certified support for wireless bridges and USB devices. Also, as a further extension of the partnership between Pano Logic and VMware, Pano VDS 2.0 fully integrates support for VMware Virtual Desktop Manager (VDM), giving users even greater deployment flexibility.

    “Desktop virtualization solutions that leverage existing server virtualization infrastructure represent an opportunity for IT organizations to extend the value of their investments. Hosting virtual desktops on servers enables IT departments to eliminate the PC for portions of their userbase, thereby significantly reducing help desk support costs,” said Michael Rose, an IDC research analyst covering virtualization software. “We are seeing these virtual desktops increasingly being made accessible to users on the edge of the network, and as such the new WAN support available in Pano’s VDS 2.0 can help provide a more realistic and flexible environment for many users leveraging Pano Logic’s devices.”

    The new features in Pano VDS 2.0:

    • Optimization for wide area network (WAN) deployments – enabling organizations to deploy Pano Logic at remote offices while keeping the desktop virtual machines and data storage secure in the corporate or regional data center.
    • Support for VMware Virtual Desktop Manager (VDM) – allowing for easy integration into existing desktop virtualization deployments which use the VDM interface for management, ensuring that users can leverage existing investments and use the management tools familiar to them.
    • Dual-monitor support – enabling easy administration of dual-monitor groups, providing users with the ability to easily roam to and from a dual-monitor workstation while optimizing their display settings.
    • Certification for wireless bridge and USB devices – allowing for wireless bridge certification which enables and certifies compatibility with a number of low-cost and widely available third-party wireless to Ethernet bridges, as well as extending support for composite USB devices such as personal digital assistants, cell phones, and combination printer/flash card readers. This new support enables Pano devices to replace PCs in critical support intensive point of service and point of sale environments.

    [Source: eWeek]