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Background

I am very new to the world of server-based virtualization (I've been running VM's on my desktops for years).

The organization I work for has recently purchased a Dell server that will be used run 4-6 virtual servers using Hyper-V (Windows Server 2012 Datacenter).

The machine has 15k SAS drives in a RAID 10 array, 64gb RAM and two socketed processors, each with 6 cores.

Question

My previous company used to virtualize everything using VMWare vSphere (which this organization can't afford). I remember a co-worker showing me realtime stats about usage and performance of each VM in relation to the host.

I can't seem to find any equivalent reporting for Hyper-V. Am I missing it? I would love better reporting than performance monitor. Ideally, I'd like real-time reporting and alerts.

Additional Info

I've read How to monitor CPU usage and performance on a Hyper-V server with several VM's, but it doesn't provide an option other than performance monitor.

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James Hill
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  • Are you running SCVMM? – smithian May 16 '13 at 16:24
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    I think you're looking for System Center Ops Manager or Virtual Machine Manager. MS might give Hyper-V away free, but all the advanced management stuff is in the [System Center Suite](http://microsoft.com/systemcenter), and a long way from free. Sidenote: ESXi from VMWare does most of the same stuff that Hyper-V does and is also free, both companies give away roughly the same base platform then charge you for all the nice management software. – Chris S May 16 '13 at 16:25
  • Few good things are free. Mind you, there are many expensive useless things.... – mfinni May 16 '13 at 16:28
  • @ChrisS, I looked into to ESXi. They seem to have a 32GB RAM cap. I'll check out SCOM and VMM. I recognize that I may be asking too much. I should probably add that I work for a small nonprofit, so $$ = unicorns. – James Hill May 16 '13 at 16:30
  • @JamesHill Unfortunately the basic tools are what's free, and are purposely limited. A SC DC License (which includes SCOM, SCVMM, and others) would run $1000-3600 (depending on exactly what kind of non-profit you are and how you buy) and there's subscription based models (which are roughly 1/3 that price per year). – Chris S May 16 '13 at 16:41

3 Answers3

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The best free option I've seen is Veeam http://www.veeam.com/virtual-server-management-one-free.html?ad=menu

Jim B
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  • Agreed. This seems like the best of the free. I'll give it another day in case someone would like to prove us wrong. Thanks! – James Hill May 16 '13 at 18:04
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As others have mentioned, SCVMM does this by default. However, don't neglect the power of PerfMon.

When you add the Hyper-V role to a server, you get a whole slew of perfmon counters that can be used to monitor your guests, which can be monitored remotely, with fancy graphs, etc.

This screenshot was ripped from MSDN blogs but illustrates the what I mean:

enter image description here

MDMoore313
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You may try this light-weight tool I bumped into recently - ApexSQL VM Monitor. It offers great possibilities for monitoring and troubleshooting.

It can also help with alerting, which is customizable in this tool - including various options like setting up thresholds and executing some external actions when alert happens, like sending an email.

Since you mentioned reporting – I checked out and it has reporting too.

Jigoro Kano
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