Forum Discussion
Hyper-V Server 2022
Free 'Microsoft Hyper-V Server' product update
Since its introduction over a decade ago in Windows Server 2008, Hyper-V technology has been, and continues to be, the foundation of Microsoft’s hypervisor platform. Hyper-V is a strategic technology for Microsoft. Microsoft continues to invest heavily in Hyper-V for a variety of scenarios such as virtualization, security, containers, gaming, and more. Hyper-V is used in Azure, Azure Local, Windows Server, Windows Client, and Xbox among others.
Starting with Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2019, the free ‘Microsoft Hyper-V Server’ product has been deprecated and is the final version of that product. Hyper-V Server 2019 is a free product available for download from the Microsoft Evaluation Center: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/evaluate-hyper-v-server-2019
Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2019 will continue to be supported under its lifecycle policy until January 2029, see this link for additional information: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/products/hyperv-server-2019.
While Microsoft has made a business decision to no longer offer the free 'Microsoft Hyper-V Server' product, this has no impact to the many other products which include the Hyper-V feature and capabilities. This change has no impact to any customers who use Windows Server or Azure Local.
For customers looking to do test or evaluation of the Hyper-V feature, Azure Local includes a 60-day free trial and can be downloaded here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-local/ . Windows Server offers a free 180-day evaluation which can be downloaded from the Evaluation Center here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter
Microsoft remains committed to meeting customers where they are and delivering innovation for on-premises virtualization and bringing unique hybrid capabilities like no other can combined with the power of Azure Arc. We are announcing that Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2019 was the last version of the free download product and that customers begin transitioning to one of the several other products which include Hyper-V or consider Azure.
Thank you,
Elden Christensen
Principal Group PM Manager
Windows Server Development Team
Microsoftathendrix Hi Andrew, to answer your question I'm a Principal PM Manager in the Azure Edge + Platform team. I'm responsible for the Server OS team for on-prem products, which includes things such as the recent Windows Server 2022 release and the OS for the Azure Stack family. Key point is that you have the right person to hear your feedback 
Thank you to everyone for the feedback so far. With this strategic shift I'm very interested in the gaps it leaves and how we can address them forward looking. Public forums can sometimes be hard, for anyone wanting to have a more personal conversation you are welcome to email me as well: EldenC at Microsoft.com
Thanks!
Elden
Hi Elden_Christensen I appreciate that you are communicating directly with the community rather than being a faceless suit behind the scenes.
I hope that you have taken much of our feedback on board. We want to work WITH you on this.
I just did some sums on this on how it affects me.
Current situation:
- Each of my Small Business clients has Dedicated physical hardware which is 1 socket with 2, 4, 6, or 8 cores.
- Hyper-V Server 2019 with 1 Windows Server Standard 2019 as the Guest VM, licensed with SPLA. There is also 1 (or more) Linux Guest OS for the few bits and bobs which work better under. Linux, and not bloating up the Windows install.
- The Windows Server Standard licensing costs about $30 USD/month, which is based on how many cores are on the physical hardware (minimum 8 cores per processor). (it's more in my currency and after tax, and the price was just jacked up as well, fun times).
According to the https://www.microsoft.com/licensing/docs/view/Services-Provider-Use-Rights-SPUR?isToggleToList=True&lang=1&year=202, which is the document which governs the SPLA...
Server Licenses (per core)
3. Standard edition
- Standard edition permits use of the server software in one OSE on the Licensed Server.
- Standard edition permits use of one Running Instance of the server software in the Physical OSE on the Licensed Server (in addition to one Virtual OSE), if the Physical OSE is used solely to host and Manage the Virtual OSE.
- Customer may assign additional Standard edition Licenses to the Licensed Server equal to the number specified in 2 above and run the server software in one additional OSE on the Licensed Server
So what this means that if I upgrade to Windows Server 2022 (i.e. Server Core installation mode) on the Physical OS, I am good to host that Windows Server Standard Guest VM. But if I were to keep that Linux one going, I would either need to separately license the Host OS for Windows Server as well, because it would no longer fit into that "solely to host and Manage the Virtual OSE" (non plural) exception. Cost goes from about $30 USD to $60 USD.
Azure Stack HCI option
If I go the other route, which is to use Azure Stack HCI. I just realised that it licensed is PER CORE not per server. I missed that bit on my first reading of it. So for the 8 core machine, it will actually cost $80 USD per MONTH (more in my currency). and if that's not bad enough, minimum of 2 machines for Azure HCI to work, bringing it to $160 USD PER MONTH. This is actual insanity. There is no way a small company is paying that. Just paying for another Windows Standard @ $30 USD per month is the better option, but shouldn't be having to pay extra in the first place for something that was supposed to be included. This has doubled the price.
So the options here are:
- Pay $180 USD per month for Azure Stack HCI (60 days free)
- Pay $30 USD per month for extra Windows Server licensing not previously necessary. $360 USD a year just to be able to run Linux VMs, really?? I rather buy an old PC to stick it on. But I shouldn't have to.
- Pay approx $332 USD per month for a similarly spec 8 Core machine on Azure (isn't Azure meant to be cheaper because of economies of scale???) (B8ms AUS region)
- Stick with Hyper-V 2019 and forego the improvements that come with Server 2022.
- Move the Linux VMs onto a separate machine, adding complexity, power usage, rack space.
- Move the Linux VMs to be nested VMs within the Windows Server VM. More complexity, less performance.
- Move hypervisor to another product.
All I can really say to this is, if we don't get a no-cost version of Server 2022 to solely to host VMs, option 7 is going to be taken even though it means more work in learning a new product and migrating. Because it will be the first step of many to move away from the Microsoft ecosystem, because we just won't be able to trust Microsoft anymore to not screw over partners.
I have put some projects on hold while I see how this plays out because it looks promising that Microsoft might listen, but I can only hold out for so long.
If you have any non-binding proposals that you would like feedback on, or just outright give us a solution to this, I would be glad to listen. As I said before, I consider Microsoft a "Partner", because we help each other both ways.
Thanks.
I have looked into both XCP-NG and Proxmox. Both are good options. XCP-NG is good if you have several Physical host servers to manage and are connected via. LAN or site-to-site VPN (or SSH tunnel), but it doesn't have a package manager to install your own tools locally.
Proxmox is good if you want the Physical host servers to be managed independently, it has plenty built in tools to do so and is built on Debian so you can add more.
With Hyper-V Server I used to install Windows Admin Center and before that a Management PC operating as a Workgroup not a Domain to manage it, so for me, Proxmox is the closest match.
XCP-NG or VMware are your big two choices. There are others such as VirtualBox and KEMU.
VMware has free options. XCP-NG is not 'too difficult', you just need to play with it and you'll find your knowledge with hv will translate over.
Hyperv is dead, we're moving on to a post-Microsoft Era in the hypervisor arena. They can't articulate what their plans for smb are beyond the original stated Azure Stack - which by extension excludes the entire smb market so, so the sooner you get moving the better.So, for people they can't continue with HyperV, what is your new hypervisor ?
Is there any forum/topic somewhere where we can chat and a solution ?
I don't know what I can take... xcp-ng seems complicated, vmware is not totaly free (replication needs licences/vsphere for exemple).
Thank in advance !Customers are going to have to leave because of those commercials. It has nothing to do with the technical capacity to migrate for these guys as they're not doing anything fancy.
I was discussing this debacle with a mate over the weekend and dug up an old quote for a small, church-run charity.
Their current per annum licencing cost (environment built on Hyper-V Server) for seven people is around AU$230. Again, that's per annum, not per month.
Based on HCI's over-the-top entry requirement of being clustered, and it's currently-listed monthly Australian subscription price of $14 per core, for a "server" (OptiPlex desktop) with eight cores, then leaving out the extra hardware cost, that comes to AU$2,688 per annum (AU$1,344 per host). And that's measured directly against Hyper-V Server's cost of AU$0.
The abandonment won't stop at the hypervisor. I've heard the concern being expressed in numerous spaces when discussing this, as it's coinciding with some negative licencing changes for education at the moment, too. As a quick example, universities that started out on Live@EDU are now abandoning their "e-mail for life" strategy and not replacing it, explaining that all content will be hard dropped. There's no positivity to be found in that messaging.
It's not that one's got anything to do with the other (re: HCI vs. edu licencing example) if you look at it objectively, but compounding negative topics ferments dissent, and given the huge OpEX impact from the charity example above, it'll be a change away from the Microsoft ecosphere (not just the hypervisor), not towards it.
For the time being, myself and my colleagues are advising the "wait and see" game, continuing on Hyper-V Server 2019 while we watch how topics like this progress, as right now, while things don't look promising, they also still appear to be somewhat fluid.
