re: What's coming up with the next versions of SCOM and SCVMM

kfsone — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 07:12:30 GMT

It continues to bewilder me that one particular niche in the virtualization market is pretty much left untouched: that of Windows as a "dom0" host. Especially in terms of software development environments, this is just strange.

Consider the recent focus on virtualization-integration for the QA/software delivery process in Visual Studio 2010; the inclusion of Virtual PC as a compatability mode solution for Windows 7...

These non-hypervisor solutions add to the demands of the desktop machine being used. And with CPU vendors going the more-cores route, surely there is a real opportunity for MS innovation here to be the first hyper-v desktop host OS out there.

Working in the computer gaming industry, I know we are already looking at options like the new MOS capable GPUs, but we're still forced to use virtual boxes rather than a dedicated virtualization desktop.

I suspect the major bottleneck is the video card. I envisage something of a cross between a user session and the old Amiga "screen"s concept (under Amiga OS in the 80s where the user could have multiple full screens and simply drag the current one down to reveal the screen behind it.

Gaming is just one sector where huge advantages could be gained from the ability to host a single development and testing environment on the same machine with ability to transfer full-screen operation between host/guest, or to dedicate a VGA/GPU card to specific OSes without the need for multiple dedicated PCs.

There are also countless cases where this would provide users with the convenience to have a Windows OS host running other operating systems as guests to facilitate and provide impetus for integration of and migration from legacy Linux apps, for example, to Windows alternatives.

Has Microsoft considered a desktop hyper-v option?