German automobile maker BMW is many things: Manufacturer of luxury cars and motorcycles; a brand name famous around the world; a giant corporation with a reputation for efficiency.
You can now add Windows 7 early adopter to that list.
The Munich-based car giant, whose headquarters building is considered an architectural icon in Europe, has 100,000 employees in 250 locations in countries such as South Africa, the United States, Canada and China. Within this vast environment, with users ranging from auto engineers to salespeople, sits 85,000 Windows machines.
BMW has been running Windows XP in its broad client environment since 2001. Happy with XP, the automaker passed on Windows Vista, so its planning for Windows 7 started early, says Bernhard Huber, BMW's Head of IT Workplace Systems.
"We identified a lot of functional and monetary benefits of Windows 7 early on," says Huber, adding that BMW first started testing the Windows 7 beta in the first quarter of this year and has increased the number of pilot users since the RTM (release to manufacturing) version of Windows 7 became available in late July.
"It is expected that 200 to 500 key users will participate in the pilot program until the end of 2009," he says.
Huber mentioned that BMW IT will increase compatibility testing with 5,000 users in a production environment in 2010, after which the rollout of Windows 7 on all machines at BMW will begin in 2011, probably around the time of Windows 7 Service Pack 1.
Better UI, Speed, App Virtualization and Memory
Huber said he sees life getting easier for BMW employees with the redesigned user interface and improved memory management of Windows 7.
The desktop features of the new OS, such as the revamped taskbar, are not usually mentioned as enterprise benefits. However, Huber envisions improved worker productivity with features like thumbnail previews, which allows for quicker switching between applications.
Huber also expects Windows 7 will further promote efficiency via its speedier startup times and improved memory management.
"Windows 7 uses its resources well and starts the applications perceptibly fast," he says. "This will make the upgrade from Windows XP to Windows 7 easier than it would have been with Vista."
Huber adds that BMW will be using XP Mode, a free virtualization feature for enterprises in Windows 7 that runs older XP-only applications through a Microsoft virtual machine containing a licensed copy of Windows XP SP3.
"With the help of application virtualization features like XP Mode, whatever software we have that is still not compatible with Windows 7 can be further used as we roll out the new OS. We can migrate legacy applications immediately and establish Windows 7 readiness later," he says.
Friday, September 4, 2009
Microsoft to deliver five critical Windows patches next week
Microsoft today said it will deliver five security updates on Tuesday, all affecting Windows and all ranked "critical," the company's highest threat rating.
Unlike some months when Microsoft provides its usual advance notification for upcoming updates, this time there weren't any hints of what may be coming, said Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Network Security.
"It's a foggy advance warning," said Storms. "I'm a little bit at a loss for words. There doesn't seem to be anything here that has been disclosed publicly."
That didn't stop Storms from speculating, though. "We could see another ATL update," he said, referring to the flaws in Active Template Library (ATL), a Microsoft code "library" that it and third-party developers use to create software.
Microsoft acknowledged the ATL vulnerabilities in July, when it issued two emergency updates to patch six bugs in its own software. Since then, it and several other vendors, including Adobe, have released additional patches for programs that inherited the ATL flaws.
"It wouldn't be surprising if Microsoft still had some ATL bugs to fix," said Storms, "although I think it's also likely that we'll see more third-party patches than ones from Microsoft."
All five of the security updates slated to ship next week are rated critical, and all five were tagged as affecting various versions of both the client and server editions of Windows. "I guess you could say that they're batting five for five on Windows," observed Storms. "It's also batting four for five for Vista and [Windows] Server 2008."
As Storms said, four of the five updates apply to Windows Vista -- all four of those are ranked critical -- while the same four will also impact Windows Server 2008, the newest production version of Microsoft's server software. Three of those Server 2008 updates were pegged critical, while the fourth was rated as "important," the next-lowest threat level.
Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 will also receive updates Tuesday.
"We usually don't expect to see Microsoft's new OSes to be critical," noted Storms. "It's also unusual that they're all for Windows. So this is out of the ordinary."
Microsoft won't be patching the just-revealed vulnerability in its popular Internet Information Services (IIS) Web server, according to Storms. "We couldn't expect Microsoft to patch it that fast," he said, reading the tea leaves of the advance notification to dismiss any thought that the bug in IIS 5.0, 5.1 and 6.0 will get a fix next week.
Even though Microsoft promised Tuesday that it would patch IIS at some point, other analysts had said it was very unlikely that Microsoft would have an IIS patch ready in time.
Next week's five updates follow the nine issued Aug. 11, the two emergency updates released in late July, and the six it shipped July 14, that month's regularly-scheduled Patch Tuesday.
Microsoft will release the five updates at approximately 1 p.m. ET on Sept 8.
Unlike some months when Microsoft provides its usual advance notification for upcoming updates, this time there weren't any hints of what may be coming, said Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Network Security.
"It's a foggy advance warning," said Storms. "I'm a little bit at a loss for words. There doesn't seem to be anything here that has been disclosed publicly."
That didn't stop Storms from speculating, though. "We could see another ATL update," he said, referring to the flaws in Active Template Library (ATL), a Microsoft code "library" that it and third-party developers use to create software.
Microsoft acknowledged the ATL vulnerabilities in July, when it issued two emergency updates to patch six bugs in its own software. Since then, it and several other vendors, including Adobe, have released additional patches for programs that inherited the ATL flaws.
"It wouldn't be surprising if Microsoft still had some ATL bugs to fix," said Storms, "although I think it's also likely that we'll see more third-party patches than ones from Microsoft."
All five of the security updates slated to ship next week are rated critical, and all five were tagged as affecting various versions of both the client and server editions of Windows. "I guess you could say that they're batting five for five on Windows," observed Storms. "It's also batting four for five for Vista and [Windows] Server 2008."
As Storms said, four of the five updates apply to Windows Vista -- all four of those are ranked critical -- while the same four will also impact Windows Server 2008, the newest production version of Microsoft's server software. Three of those Server 2008 updates were pegged critical, while the fourth was rated as "important," the next-lowest threat level.
Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 will also receive updates Tuesday.
"We usually don't expect to see Microsoft's new OSes to be critical," noted Storms. "It's also unusual that they're all for Windows. So this is out of the ordinary."
Microsoft won't be patching the just-revealed vulnerability in its popular Internet Information Services (IIS) Web server, according to Storms. "We couldn't expect Microsoft to patch it that fast," he said, reading the tea leaves of the advance notification to dismiss any thought that the bug in IIS 5.0, 5.1 and 6.0 will get a fix next week.
Even though Microsoft promised Tuesday that it would patch IIS at some point, other analysts had said it was very unlikely that Microsoft would have an IIS patch ready in time.
Next week's five updates follow the nine issued Aug. 11, the two emergency updates released in late July, and the six it shipped July 14, that month's regularly-scheduled Patch Tuesday.
Microsoft will release the five updates at approximately 1 p.m. ET on Sept 8.
Appeals court grants Microsoft reprieve in Word case
A federal appeals court late today granted Microsoft's request to suspend an injunction that would have barred the company from selling its Word software next month.
In a short order filed near the end of the day, the Court of Appeals for the Federal District approved Microsoft's earlier request for a stay of the injunction.
"Without prejudicing the ultimate determination of this case by the merits panel, the court determines based upon the motion papers submitted that Microsoft has met its burden to obtain a stay of the injunction," the court said.
The injunction would have prevented Microsoft from selling Word 2003 and Word 2007 in their current forms after Oct 10, and was ordered by U.S. District Court Judge Leonard Davis on Aug. 11, after the company was found guilty in May by a Texas jury of infringing a patent held by Canadian software developer i4i. Davis also awarded i4i more than $290 million in damages and interest.
On Aug. 18, Microsoft filed a motion to stay the injunction while it took the case to appeal. In that motion, Microsoft warned of "massive disruptions" to its sales, as well as those of important OEM partners such as Dell and Hewlett-Packard, if the injunction was not put on hold.
Microsoft also said that the injunction, and the resulting need to retool Word to remove the infringing "custom" XML feature, could keep Word 2003 and Word 2007 -- and the suites that they are part of, Office 2003 and Office 2007 -- off the market for months.
Several days later, Microsoft was granted a fast-track appeals process, which requires i4i to file a response to Microsoft's appeal by next Tuesday, Sept. 8. Microsoft's rebuttal must reach the court by noon on Sept. 14.
Both Dell and HP have filed amicus curiae, or "friend of the court," briefs, arguing that Word's revision, and the resulting changes necessary on their part to re-image new PCs, would "require extensive time- and resource-consuming retesting."
Dell and HP also asked that, assuming a stay was not granted, that the injunction be postponed by 120 days.
"We are happy with the result and look forward to presenting our arguments on the main issues on September 23," said Microsoft spokesman Kevin Kutz in an e-mail today.
Kutz's reference was to the oral hearing before the Court of Appeals, during which both sides will present their cases. The three-judge panel will render its verdict at some point after the Sept. 23 hearing.
Representatives for i4i were not available for comment late Thursday.
In a short order filed near the end of the day, the Court of Appeals for the Federal District approved Microsoft's earlier request for a stay of the injunction.
"Without prejudicing the ultimate determination of this case by the merits panel, the court determines based upon the motion papers submitted that Microsoft has met its burden to obtain a stay of the injunction," the court said.
The injunction would have prevented Microsoft from selling Word 2003 and Word 2007 in their current forms after Oct 10, and was ordered by U.S. District Court Judge Leonard Davis on Aug. 11, after the company was found guilty in May by a Texas jury of infringing a patent held by Canadian software developer i4i. Davis also awarded i4i more than $290 million in damages and interest.
On Aug. 18, Microsoft filed a motion to stay the injunction while it took the case to appeal. In that motion, Microsoft warned of "massive disruptions" to its sales, as well as those of important OEM partners such as Dell and Hewlett-Packard, if the injunction was not put on hold.
Microsoft also said that the injunction, and the resulting need to retool Word to remove the infringing "custom" XML feature, could keep Word 2003 and Word 2007 -- and the suites that they are part of, Office 2003 and Office 2007 -- off the market for months.
Several days later, Microsoft was granted a fast-track appeals process, which requires i4i to file a response to Microsoft's appeal by next Tuesday, Sept. 8. Microsoft's rebuttal must reach the court by noon on Sept. 14.
Both Dell and HP have filed amicus curiae, or "friend of the court," briefs, arguing that Word's revision, and the resulting changes necessary on their part to re-image new PCs, would "require extensive time- and resource-consuming retesting."
Dell and HP also asked that, assuming a stay was not granted, that the injunction be postponed by 120 days.
"We are happy with the result and look forward to presenting our arguments on the main issues on September 23," said Microsoft spokesman Kevin Kutz in an e-mail today.
Kutz's reference was to the oral hearing before the Court of Appeals, during which both sides will present their cases. The three-judge panel will render its verdict at some point after the Sept. 23 hearing.
Representatives for i4i were not available for comment late Thursday.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Veeam Extends Its Leadership in VMware Backup Market with New Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0
Veeam Software, award-winning provider of systems management tools for VMware virtual datacenter environments, today announced version 4.0 of Veeam Backup & Replication, the #1 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.
“With VCB being phased out, the vStorage API is the recommended API for VMware vSphere backup,” explained Ratmir Timashev, Veeam President and CEO. “Native support for the vStorage API makes Veeam Backup & Replication the most advanced and future-proof solution available on the market, extending its technology leadership with innovative features and functionality requested by our customers.”
“Not only is Veeam Backup & Replication easy to deploy and manage, but it is also cost-effective,” commented Veeam customer Paul Redpath, Technical Director, Catalyst2 Services Ltd. “We’re getting more for our money as we grow our infrastructure because with Veeam, we’re experiencing 30 to 40 percent data compression during backups. It adds up to real storage cost savings.”
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
And much more
The full list of new features is described in a three-page document “What’s New in Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0” available at www.veeam.com/go/backup40.
Pricing and Availability
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. More information, including a product video, is available at www.veeam.com/go/backup40.
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.
“With VCB being phased out, the vStorage API is the recommended API for VMware vSphere backup,” explained Ratmir Timashev, Veeam President and CEO. “Native support for the vStorage API makes Veeam Backup & Replication the most advanced and future-proof solution available on the market, extending its technology leadership with innovative features and functionality requested by our customers.”
“Not only is Veeam Backup & Replication easy to deploy and manage, but it is also cost-effective,” commented Veeam customer Paul Redpath, Technical Director, Catalyst2 Services Ltd. “We’re getting more for our money as we grow our infrastructure because with Veeam, we’re experiencing 30 to 40 percent data compression during backups. It adds up to real storage cost savings.”
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
And much more
The full list of new features is described in a three-page document “What’s New in Veeam Backup & Replication 4.0” available at www.veeam.com/go/backup40.
Pricing and Availability
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. More information, including a product video, is available at www.veeam.com/go/backup40.
Sybase Works With Symantec and VMware to Strengthen Data Infrastructure for Grid and Cloud Computing Environments With Latest Release of Adaptive Serv
Sybase, Inc. (NYSE:SY), an industry leader in delivering enterprise and mobile software, today announced the newest release of Adaptive Server® Enterprise (ASE) Cluster Edition, its enterprise data management solution that reduces the complexity of deploying a database application across a shared disk server cluster environment.
Sybase has worked with its early customers and partners to help enterprises realize the benefits of grid and virtualized deployment in its latest version of ASE Cluster Edition. By providing dynamic resource management for a virtualized database environment, ASE Cluster Edition allows enterprises to meet customer service level agreements (SLAs) of their critical databases for availability while also reducing infrastructure costs through optimal resource utilization.
“Historically, deploying clustered systems on physical hardware has been complex and costly to test, develop, deploy and manage,” said Parag Patel, vice president, alliances at VMware. “Now, with Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise Cluster Edition running on the industry-leading VMware platform, customers have further proof that they can virtualize their mission-critical workloads, simplify their management, and achieve levels of availability and continuity not possible on physical systems.”
“Together, Symantec and Sybase are delivering a truly integrated database and storage clustering solution to joint customers,” said Josh Kahn, vice president of product management, Storage and Availability Management Group at Symantec. “The combination of Sybase’s ASE Cluster Edition database and Veritas Storage Foundation for Sybase® ASE CE empowers customers with significant improvements in performance, availability and data management.”
ASE Cluster Edition’s newest enhancements provide key enabling technologies to ease manageability and improve availability in grid and cloud computing environments. Sybase has developed the latest version of ASE Cluster Edition to include:
Expanded partner ecosystem
Integration with Veritas Storage Foundation™ and Veritas™ Cluster Server – increasing the manageability, performance and availability of shared storage environments
Participation in the VMware® vCloud initiative – providing support for cloud computing environments
Extended Availability
Disaster recovery site support – allowing cluster support at remote sites if a primary site goes down
Ease of Manageability
Local installation - each node can be installed independently, improving flexibility and increasing availability of other nodes should one go down
Foundation for rolling upgrades – enabling independent maintenance of each node
“Because of its ability to provide agile deployment of physical resources, including servers and storage, and to deploy databases in a highly virtualized way, defining virtual servers and virtual clusters within the managed set of physical resources, Sybase ASE Cluster Edition provides features that enable the kind of flexibility and scalability necessary to deploy a database in the cloud. Also, because grid computing requires great flexibility and places highly variable workload demands on databases, features such as those in Sybase ASE Cluster Edition would seem essential to deploying database applications in a grid-based fashion,” said Carl Olofson, research vice president for Information Management and Data Integration, IDC1.
“The latest release of ASE Cluster Edition incorporates the feedback we've received from our customers, who run some of the world's most critical data in areas such as financial services, telecommunications and government,” said Brian Vink, vice president Database Products at Sybase. “We continue to work closely with our customers and partners to deliver innovative database technologies like ASE Cluster Edition that offer superior availability, resource optimization and low total cost of ownership.”
Availability
Sybase ASE Cluster Edition is currently available. Please visit http://www.sybase.com/clusters for more information.
Sybase has worked with its early customers and partners to help enterprises realize the benefits of grid and virtualized deployment in its latest version of ASE Cluster Edition. By providing dynamic resource management for a virtualized database environment, ASE Cluster Edition allows enterprises to meet customer service level agreements (SLAs) of their critical databases for availability while also reducing infrastructure costs through optimal resource utilization.
“Historically, deploying clustered systems on physical hardware has been complex and costly to test, develop, deploy and manage,” said Parag Patel, vice president, alliances at VMware. “Now, with Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise Cluster Edition running on the industry-leading VMware platform, customers have further proof that they can virtualize their mission-critical workloads, simplify their management, and achieve levels of availability and continuity not possible on physical systems.”
“Together, Symantec and Sybase are delivering a truly integrated database and storage clustering solution to joint customers,” said Josh Kahn, vice president of product management, Storage and Availability Management Group at Symantec. “The combination of Sybase’s ASE Cluster Edition database and Veritas Storage Foundation for Sybase® ASE CE empowers customers with significant improvements in performance, availability and data management.”
ASE Cluster Edition’s newest enhancements provide key enabling technologies to ease manageability and improve availability in grid and cloud computing environments. Sybase has developed the latest version of ASE Cluster Edition to include:
Expanded partner ecosystem
Integration with Veritas Storage Foundation™ and Veritas™ Cluster Server – increasing the manageability, performance and availability of shared storage environments
Participation in the VMware® vCloud initiative – providing support for cloud computing environments
Extended Availability
Disaster recovery site support – allowing cluster support at remote sites if a primary site goes down
Ease of Manageability
Local installation - each node can be installed independently, improving flexibility and increasing availability of other nodes should one go down
Foundation for rolling upgrades – enabling independent maintenance of each node
“Because of its ability to provide agile deployment of physical resources, including servers and storage, and to deploy databases in a highly virtualized way, defining virtual servers and virtual clusters within the managed set of physical resources, Sybase ASE Cluster Edition provides features that enable the kind of flexibility and scalability necessary to deploy a database in the cloud. Also, because grid computing requires great flexibility and places highly variable workload demands on databases, features such as those in Sybase ASE Cluster Edition would seem essential to deploying database applications in a grid-based fashion,” said Carl Olofson, research vice president for Information Management and Data Integration, IDC1.
“The latest release of ASE Cluster Edition incorporates the feedback we've received from our customers, who run some of the world's most critical data in areas such as financial services, telecommunications and government,” said Brian Vink, vice president Database Products at Sybase. “We continue to work closely with our customers and partners to deliver innovative database technologies like ASE Cluster Edition that offer superior availability, resource optimization and low total cost of ownership.”
Availability
Sybase ASE Cluster Edition is currently available. Please visit http://www.sybase.com/clusters for more information.
VMware Announces More Than 21,000 New Customers in the First Half of 2009 and Strong Customer Traction With VMware vSphere
VMware, Inc., the global leader in virtualization solutions from the desktop through the datacenter and to the cloud, announced strong customer traction for VMware's industry-leading virtualization platform. In the first half of 2009, more than 21,000 new customers have purchased VMware solutions -- equivalent to an average of 121 new customers per day. In addition, VMware vSphere™ 4 has reached more than 350,000 downloads in the first 12 weeks of general availability -- at an average rate of 140 downloads per hour. According to a recent poll on http://www.vmware.com/, approximately 75 percent of customers that responded are upgrading or plan to upgrade to VMware vSphere™ 4 within the next six months.
VMware vSphere™ 4 delivers customers the following critical benefits: offers unmatched cost savings; delivers the efficiency and performance required to run business critical applications; provides uncompromised control over application service levels, and preserves customer choice of hardware, OS, application architecture and on-premise vs. off-premise application hosting.
Unmatched Cost Savings Even Compared to So-Called "Free" Offerings
VMware vSphere™ 4 helps customers reduce capital expenses by up to 60 percent and operational expenses by an average of 33 percent. By allowing companies to make more efficient use of today's powerful servers, VMware vSphere™ 4 also enables unmatched cost savings even when compared to so-called "free" offerings.
"As a result of upgrading to VMware vSphere 4, the museum has saved $200,000 AUD on hardware procurement costs since migrating from VMware Infrastructure 3. We've also reduced our power requirements by 33 percent and have achieved a server consolidation ratio of 12:1," said Dan Collins, manager of information technology at Powerhouse Museum. "VMware vSphere 4 has also dramatically improved our infrastructure responsiveness and flexibility, and most importantly enhanced our recoverability of systems and information."
Boosted Performance and Improved Service Levels for Business Critical Applications
With VMware vSphere 4, customers are extending the benefits of virtualization to business critical applications such e-mail, database, ERP, CRM systems and others. Customers are reporting significant increases in application performance, reliability and scalability after deploying VMware vSphere™ 4.
"After seeing the benefits of virtualizing our infrastructure applications, we wanted to move our SQL database into the virtualized environment," said Roy K. Turner, server systems engineer, Frederick Memorial Hospital. "The improved performance and enhanced reliability in VMware vSphere 4 have been invaluable in exceeding our SLAs and preventing revenue loss from our mission-critical applications. VMware Fault Tolerance further improves uptime for our most critical applications by providing zero-downtime recovery from hardware failures, while VMware Data Recovery helps us easily back up and protect our critical data."
"With VMware, we've found that we can roll out new services much faster, as well as increase the reliability of existing services, while cutting the costs of doing both," said Bob Plankers, technical architect, University of Wisconsin - Madison. "With VMware vSphere 4, our infrastructure management becomes much simpler through the use of new VMware vNetwork Distributed Switch and Host Profiles. VMware vSphere 4 also increased the amount of I/O, memory, and CPU available, meaning we can virtualize nearly every workload we have."
VMware vSphere™ 4 delivers customers the following critical benefits: offers unmatched cost savings; delivers the efficiency and performance required to run business critical applications; provides uncompromised control over application service levels, and preserves customer choice of hardware, OS, application architecture and on-premise vs. off-premise application hosting.
Unmatched Cost Savings Even Compared to So-Called "Free" Offerings
VMware vSphere™ 4 helps customers reduce capital expenses by up to 60 percent and operational expenses by an average of 33 percent. By allowing companies to make more efficient use of today's powerful servers, VMware vSphere™ 4 also enables unmatched cost savings even when compared to so-called "free" offerings.
"As a result of upgrading to VMware vSphere 4, the museum has saved $200,000 AUD on hardware procurement costs since migrating from VMware Infrastructure 3. We've also reduced our power requirements by 33 percent and have achieved a server consolidation ratio of 12:1," said Dan Collins, manager of information technology at Powerhouse Museum. "VMware vSphere 4 has also dramatically improved our infrastructure responsiveness and flexibility, and most importantly enhanced our recoverability of systems and information."
Boosted Performance and Improved Service Levels for Business Critical Applications
With VMware vSphere 4, customers are extending the benefits of virtualization to business critical applications such e-mail, database, ERP, CRM systems and others. Customers are reporting significant increases in application performance, reliability and scalability after deploying VMware vSphere™ 4.
"After seeing the benefits of virtualizing our infrastructure applications, we wanted to move our SQL database into the virtualized environment," said Roy K. Turner, server systems engineer, Frederick Memorial Hospital. "The improved performance and enhanced reliability in VMware vSphere 4 have been invaluable in exceeding our SLAs and preventing revenue loss from our mission-critical applications. VMware Fault Tolerance further improves uptime for our most critical applications by providing zero-downtime recovery from hardware failures, while VMware Data Recovery helps us easily back up and protect our critical data."
"With VMware, we've found that we can roll out new services much faster, as well as increase the reliability of existing services, while cutting the costs of doing both," said Bob Plankers, technical architect, University of Wisconsin - Madison. "With VMware vSphere 4, our infrastructure management becomes much simpler through the use of new VMware vNetwork Distributed Switch and Host Profiles. VMware vSphere 4 also increased the amount of I/O, memory, and CPU available, meaning we can virtualize nearly every workload we have."
Wyse Technology Improves Virtual Desktop Environments With New Flash Acceleration Technology
Wyse Technology, the global leader in thin computing and client virtualization, today officially announced its new acceleration solution for Adobe Flash, as part of its incredibly popular TCX virtualization software suite. The new functionality improves the end user experience on virtual desktops by solving the Flash content quality challenge for VDI and Terminal Services environments.
"Every end user wants the performance of their thin client to be as good as or better than their PC," according to Mark Bowker, Analyst, Enterprise Strategy Group. "Wyse has been steadily deploying software as part of its TCX suite toward that end and the addition of Flash acceleration capabilities will help accelerate virtual desktop adoption."
With Flash applications abundant in all industry verticals, especially financial services and education, customers are thrilled that the content acceleration challenge has been solved without compromising the end user experience.
Offered as part of the Wyse TCX virtualization software suite, the new Flash acceleration extends the capabilities of the Microsoft RDP and Citrix ICA/HDX protocols for Flash Player 9 and 10 and Internet Explorer 6 and 7. Compatibility with VMware View and Citrix XenDesktop connection brokers, using Windows XP Pro, Vista or Windows 7 completes the solution.
"Wyse continues to innovate and stretch the capabilities of their thin clients to provide a rich virtual desktop experience," said Sumit Dhawan, vice president, product marketing, XenDesktop product group at Citrix Systems. "Wyse technologies perfectly complement and extend Citrix HDX technologies to deliver an excellent, high-definition user experience and expand the ability of IT to offer virtual desktops to a wide variety of users."
With Flash acceleration, end users' animation, online training, YouTube, and video-rich Web sites are now seamlessly presented.
"Thin client customers using sites like CNN.com and NYSE MarkeTRAC with Flash-based tickers, are significantly improved by Wyse's new Flash content acceleration capabilities," says Param Desai, Product Manager at Wyse Technology. "Flash acceleration continues our efforts to make the thin client user experience even better than a PC."
Pricing and Availability
Flash acceleration will be commercially available in October 2009, available on Wyse's V class and R class thin clients with Windows XP Embedded, Windows Embedded Standard 2009, or Wyse ThinOS operating systems, and supported PCs. For more information on Flash acceleration and Wyse TCX, please visit http://www.wyse.com/products/software/tcx/
"Every end user wants the performance of their thin client to be as good as or better than their PC," according to Mark Bowker, Analyst, Enterprise Strategy Group. "Wyse has been steadily deploying software as part of its TCX suite toward that end and the addition of Flash acceleration capabilities will help accelerate virtual desktop adoption."
With Flash applications abundant in all industry verticals, especially financial services and education, customers are thrilled that the content acceleration challenge has been solved without compromising the end user experience.
Offered as part of the Wyse TCX virtualization software suite, the new Flash acceleration extends the capabilities of the Microsoft RDP and Citrix ICA/HDX protocols for Flash Player 9 and 10 and Internet Explorer 6 and 7. Compatibility with VMware View and Citrix XenDesktop connection brokers, using Windows XP Pro, Vista or Windows 7 completes the solution.
"Wyse continues to innovate and stretch the capabilities of their thin clients to provide a rich virtual desktop experience," said Sumit Dhawan, vice president, product marketing, XenDesktop product group at Citrix Systems. "Wyse technologies perfectly complement and extend Citrix HDX technologies to deliver an excellent, high-definition user experience and expand the ability of IT to offer virtual desktops to a wide variety of users."
With Flash acceleration, end users' animation, online training, YouTube, and video-rich Web sites are now seamlessly presented.
"Thin client customers using sites like CNN.com and NYSE MarkeTRAC with Flash-based tickers, are significantly improved by Wyse's new Flash content acceleration capabilities," says Param Desai, Product Manager at Wyse Technology. "Flash acceleration continues our efforts to make the thin client user experience even better than a PC."
Pricing and Availability
Flash acceleration will be commercially available in October 2009, available on Wyse's V class and R class thin clients with Windows XP Embedded, Windows Embedded Standard 2009, or Wyse ThinOS operating systems, and supported PCs. For more information on Flash acceleration and Wyse TCX, please visit http://www.wyse.com/products/software/tcx/
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