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
MicrosoftHey Zak, this is a really big long thread. For Imschmidt's sanity and the huge numbers of others who get email spam notifications about it, let's not hijack this thread to another topic. Please start a new thread, and I'm happy to talk about Windows Server UI strategy.
Thanks!
Elden
I am not sure if Linux as a base OS for the platform is released, is it? As of today it requires Azure Local PAYG for active cores per month or Windows Server Datacenter with SA (Enterprise Agreement only!) or CSP Subscription (MCA).
Azure Local and Azure Stack HCI is the same product but it adds more capabilities now and in the future and so the name didn't fit any longer.
More information on Azure Local
On the topic yes it uses Hyper-V as virtualization platform, just like Azure itself does - with exception of dedicated HW in Azure with VMware or Azure VMware solution offering.
I don’t think Azure Local and Azure Stack HCI are the same thing. Azure Stack HCI is an operating system, while Azure Local is a service that allows you to connect your local server and remotely access it through the Azure portal. With Azure Local, you also have the option to install Linux instead of Azure Stack HCI.
I've not read the documentation in any detail, but isn't Azure Local just Azure Stack HCI with a new name? That was what I assumed from the news items.
Azure local is pretty awesome! $10/core is deal breaker 😟 my cpu is not even that good. Core doesnt mean anything my budget for microserver is $10 a month at most.
Elden_ChristensenI just saw the https://youtu.be/yxlAfS9mh2E?si=M5OJuYcf4eDFwIl3, and the Low Cost wording really had my attention.
I was so excited, thinking MS listened to all of us MSP's about how abandoning Hyper-V server left SMB in the lurch. Then I watched the video... it looked perfect, like an introduction/entry-level Stack HCL, with budget server gear. Only to flip over to the Product Page and discover this isn't any change or new SKU at all. The licensing is still the same $10/core. Who can afford to pay for Stack, but then uses cheap hardware? 🤔
Announcement: 'Good news - Stack now runs on budget hardware!' Translation: 'After buying Stack licenses, budget hardware is all you'll be able to afford!' 🙃 I kid I kid.Jokes aside, the reality is that price model absolutely does not work for SMB. There is no chance our clients in the SMB space will pay hundreds of dollars a month just for the OS platform - let alone the OS/CAL's too. I can see it being of value in a min-datacenter at a corp HQ, but not for SMB. We MSP's control our client's hardware/infra to a pretty significant level. We don't want to go back to bare metal with HV role. There are numerous advantages to having a thin hypervisor OS with all the servers being VM's. Your retreat from SMB and VMware jumping the shark has led to ancillary software vendors taking notice and embrace XCP-NG and Proxmox. Veeam is one example and now has full support. This pushes us in those directions - away from MS. We don't want to do this and I don't understand why MS wants us to.
Why not make it easy for SMB and maintain vendor-lock-in? A free "light tier" is warranted and solves everything. Make it limited to 3 hosts restricted at the Azure Tenant level or something. Doing this does not cannibalize any Stack sales in this scenario, as anyone interested in this would never have paid for Stack - they would use a different platform (which is our current plan for all clients). This gets everyone into the Stack/Azure ecosystem as well as achieve vendor-lock-in. As they grow they logically move right into "Full Stack" via Key change, and/or Azure itself. This also would solve all the home-lab folks wanting to learn/tinker and help us all eat our own dogfood doing so.
You don't need to abandon the SMB space, so please don't. I will give you exactly 3 goats for making this a reality. Can't resist that kind of logic, and carrot, right?
