Hyper-V Performance Measurement

Some good reading on Hyper-V and performance:

• All Topics Performance Blog: Hyper-V Performance FAQ
• All Topics Performance Blog: Hyper-V: How to make sure you are getting the best performance when doing performance comparisons
• MSDN: Measuring Performance on Hyper-V
• MSDN: Optimizing Performance on Hyper-V

In the beginning, it can be tough to figure out how a particular hardware configuration will behave once Hyper-V has been loaded up on a Server Core or a Windows Server 2008 full install.

If running Hyper-V on a full install of Windows Server 2008, keep in mind that there will be a significant number of patches needed for the various GUI and browser related components on Win2K8 full that Server Core will not need. This means more reboots for a full Win2K8 Hyper-V setup.

The full install will also use more resources for itself. Thus, leaving less resources over for the virtual machines.

One thing is for sure: RAID 1+0 for your VM VHD files is a good place to start. The more spindles for that RAID 1+0 array, the better the performance.

In larger settings, there are hardware and network/hardware solutions that would facilitate storage for the Hyper-V server that may no be on the box itself. But, that is beyond the scope of our SMB focus.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists

*All Mac on SBS posts will not be written on a Mac until we replace our now missing iMac!

Windows Live Writer