Managing VI3 with SCVMM considered harmful

According to Microsoft, one of the great features of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 is the ability to manage not only Hyper-V virtual machines but also VMware Infrastructure — vCenter and ESX.  In fact, of the Top Ten Benefits, this is listed as number two:

With this release, VMM now manages VMware ESX virtualized infrastructure in conjunction with the Virtual Center product. Now administrators running multiple virtualization platforms can rely on one tool to manage virtually everything.

The What’s New list also gives top billing to multi-vendor virtualization support — here “multi” means two.  The press sure went crazy over the integration, too.  But for those of you that are actually responsible for managing virtualization, what benefit does this bring?  Perhaps unsurprisingly, not much.  Have you tried to run Linux VMs on Hyper-V?  That is a taste of just how ineffective the cross-platform hypervisor story has been so far.

I’ve written a number of articles on SCVMM-VI3 management shortcomings.  Here are some of the key problem areas:

• Lack of VMware Resource Pool awareness
• Destruction of VMware vCenter templates
• Botched management of VMware ESX port groups
• Unnecessary ISO image file proliferation
• PRO Tips not working as expected for ESX hosts
• Disconnect of VI Clients on SCVMM restart
• Manual cleanup required after SCVMM-VI3 integration
  

Recently, VMware published an update to the Why Choose VMware website  that includes a six-video series detailing exactly why administrators need the full functionality of the VI Client in order to get the most out of a VMware investment.  Using the SCVMM GUI and the lowest common denominator approach to hypervisor management strips away benefits and efficiency from the more advanced platform — VMware ESX.