Just a few notes from personal experience rather than any attempt at a formal (or fair) comparison. I’ve been using VMWare Server fairly extensively for a while for various tasks, including quick and portable server provisioning, repeatable testing and general virtual machines for experimentation. Although I’ve had a few minor issues, in general it’s been a rock solid platform for me. Recently I was forced to use Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 for a particular task, and I’m not quite so keen on that.
Rather than reams of text, I’ll summarise the differences as I see them in table form. Some of the content will be factual, and some just personal opinion. I may even throw in some speculation for good measure.
| VMWare | Microsoft | |
|---|---|---|
| Licensing | Proprietary, Free-as-in-beer | |
| Host compatibility | Windows (including 2K*) or Linux | Windows Server 2003, or (grudgingly**) XP Pro |
| Guest compatibility | Windows, Linux, Solaris, including 64 bit | Windows 2003/2000/XP/NT |
| Networking | Extensive options for configuring virtual networks that include NAT and port forwarding | Somewhat lacking compared to VMWare |
| Performance | Not tested. I would guess there is not much separating the two. | |
| Management | Excellent management console. Also a web interface which I haven’t used. | Web interface only, and I don’t like it. Also only works on IE, needless to say. |
| VM compatibility | VMware and Microsoft VMs | Microsoft only |
| Scriptability | Perl, COM, API | Well hidden if it’s possible |
| Scalability | Various steps up including ESX Server | This is it |
| Overall opinion | Undisputed market leader, rock-solid platform, with VMware server being just one piece of the complate VMware virtualisation jigsaw | Outclassed and pointless. Don’t make me use it again. |
Feel free to point out any inaccuracies in the above, or any significant differences I am missing.
*Yes, VMware’s product does support Windows better than Microsoft’s, that’s not a mistake (or at least, not mine)
**XP Pro compatibility is billed as ‘not for production use’
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