05 Feb 2008 07:20 PM EST

We are pleased to introduce the public beta release of Citrix XenServer 4.1.
Citrix XenServer 4.1 is a service pack that enhances the previous v4 release.  New capabilities and improvements include:

  • Scalability and Performance
    • Twice the number of simultaneous running VMs
    • Rapid Virtualization Indexing (RVI - formerly nested page table, or NPT) support for modern AMD processors
    • VLAN support in Standard Edition
    • Improved Citrix Presentation Server performance and maximum number of user sessions
  • Reliability and Manageability
    • Host NIC bonding for fail-over (configured via CLI)
    • Centralized logging
    • Configuration of network management interfaces via the CLI
    • Update/patch management integrated in XenCenter
    • Java bindings for XenAPI in SDK
  • Storage
    • Shared Fibre Channel storage support (initialized via CLI)
    • Enhanced support for NetApp filers, including snapshot and cloning
    • Windows guest disk hot-remove
    • iSCSI improvements
    • Support for hot-plugging USB storage as a storage repository
  • Host System
    • Rolling pool upgrade support
    • NIC driver updates (e1000, BNX2, TG3)
    • Support several 10Gb network adapters (Mellanox/Chelsio)
    • Improved hardware support
  • Guest Support
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 32-bit and CentOS 5 32-bit install from physical CD
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 x64 and CentOS 5 x64 guest support
    • Oracle Enterprise Linux 5 x86 and x64 guest support
    • Windows Vista x86 guest support
Permalink | Comments (6) |

Comments  (Hide Comments)

Roger, what iSCSI improvements were made? Marc Farley - Dell (EqualLogic)

Posted by Anonymous at Feb 06, 2008 12:04 | Reply To This

I'll check into more, but the two I can think of off the top of my head are: - Richer support for the QLogic HBA (so that, for instance, you can create a shared Storage Repository on the hardware as well as software initiator -- you need to initialize it via the CLI just as you would a Fibre Channel SR) - Updated version of openiSCSI to pick up some fixes, including the reported crashes with OpenSolaris/ZFS volumes

Posted by Roger Klorese at Feb 07, 2008 11:31 | Reply To This

Can we have some performance data on the improvements to Presentation Server performance in 4.1 and the number of sessions per server?

It would be good to have this

1. Compared to bare metal PS install (no Hypervisor)

2. Compared to ESX

Thanks

Posted by Anonymous at Feb 06, 2008 13:56 | Reply To This

We have a paper in production. Some initial data were presented at Citrix Summit last week, and we will be able to make it available shortly. I can tell you that there is overhead -- the choice is ultimately whether one's highest priority is sheer capacity or the additional flexibility, isolation, provisioning speed, etc. that virtualization affords. If you choose virtualization, then XenServer yields the best performance figures. As I said, numbers to follow shortly.

(I'm not sure what we'll say with regard to ESX due to the amount of work it takes to jump through their EULA hoops for permission to publish.)

Posted by Roger Klorese at Feb 07, 2008 10:34 | Reply To This

We have a different driver: -

We pay a fixed price per server for maintenance, support, hosting etc from our service provider regardless of it's size or workload. As a result a 2 CPU, 2GB PS Server would cost the same as an 8 way Quad Core server with 64Gb memory which could potentially host 16 PS servers?. Providing the overhead of XenServer is sufficiently low then we would move to this as a solution.

Two final questions for you Roger: -

1. Any date on the paper?

2. I've seen conflicting information on how XenServer is now priced(post summit). Some says per server and some say per 2 socket server - can you clear this up please.

Posted by Anonymous at Feb 07, 2008 13:38 | Reply To This

The best I can tell you is that it should be within the month -- I hope it will be sooner. XenServer continues to be priced per socket pair.

Posted by Roger Klorese at Feb 07, 2008 13:46 | Reply To This