Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT), the world's leading provider of open-source solutions, today announced the general availability of Red Hat Virtualization 4.2, the newest release of its Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)-powered virtualization platform. Built on the enterprise-grade backbone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 offers significant product updates from a simplified user interface to new capabilities around virtual networking, pairing new capabilities with Red Hat’s enterprise-grade reliability and support to lay a more stable foundation for IT innovation. Introduced in tandem with the new version is Red Hat Virtualization Suite, comprised of Red Hat Virtualization and Red Hat CloudForms, Red Hat’s hybrid infrastructure management platform, offering a pre-integrated, simplified access point to open virtualization technologies combined with management.

Red Hat Virtualization allows our customers to access the economics, performance and agility they need from their virtualized infrastructure." Gunnar Hellekson director, product management, Linux and Virtualization, Red Hat

Rather than layering open innovation on top of proprietary infrastructure, Red Hat Virtualization provides an alternative, offering an open software-defined infrastructure and centralized management platform for virtualized Linux and Windows workloads. This is designed to enable customers to modernize traditional applications for greater efficiency, while also creating a launchpad for cloud-native and container-based application innovation.

The latest version of Red Hat Virtualization builds on Red Hat’s recognized leadership for high performing, highly-available, and more easily scalable virtual machine (VM) workloads. Specifically, Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 introduces new and enhanced capabilities around:

User Interface (UI) – Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 delivers an easier-to-use and more intuitive user interface. Using the open source PatternFly project, the Red Hat Virtualization UI now provides a cohesive look and feel to other Red Hat offerings, including Red Hat CloudForms. This is designed to help increase productivity for IT operations, as users can more comfortably move between management tools without having to relearn basic functions.

– Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 delivers an easier-to-use and more intuitive user interface. Using the open source PatternFly project, the Red Hat Virtualization UI now provides a cohesive look and feel to other Red Hat offerings, including Red Hat CloudForms. This is designed to help increase productivity for IT operations, as users can more comfortably move between management tools without having to relearn basic functions. Disaster Recovery (DR) – New disaster recovery capabilities within Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 deliver a native site-to-site failover capability. Instead of depending on integration with a specific storage vendor, Red Hat Virtualization can use storage at both primary and failover sites with more reliable and consistent data replication. Adding to this functionality are Red Hat Ansible Playbooks and Roles that better enable automated failover and failback of DR processes, which limits the potential for human error to cause data and operational losses.

– New disaster recovery capabilities within Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 deliver a native site-to-site failover capability. Instead of depending on integration with a specific storage vendor, Red Hat Virtualization can use storage at both primary and failover sites with more reliable and consistent data replication. Adding to this functionality are Red Hat Ansible Playbooks and Roles that better enable automated failover and failback of DR processes, which limits the potential for human error to cause data and operational losses. Software-Defined Networking (SDN) – Open Virtual Network (OVN) has been integrated with Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 to deliver a native SDN solution through Open vSwitch. This is designed to provide automated management of network infrastructure and a Neutron compatible API for external network providers, as well as network self-service for users, which helps to free up network administrators from user requests for additional infrastructure.

– Open Virtual Network (OVN) has been integrated with Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 to deliver a native SDN solution through Open vSwitch. This is designed to provide automated management of network infrastructure and a Neutron compatible API for external network providers, as well as network self-service for users, which helps to free up network administrators from user requests for additional infrastructure. Metrics and Logging – The new metrics and logging features of Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 deliver enhanced real-time reporting and visualization capabilities built around the Elasticsearch, Fluentd, and Kibana (EFK), which help to drive increased operational efficiency.

– The new metrics and logging features of Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 deliver enhanced real-time reporting and visualization capabilities built around the Elasticsearch, Fluentd, and Kibana (EFK), which help to drive increased operational efficiency. High Performance VM – Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 provides a new high performance VM option, which is designed to streamline the process of configuring a high-performing VM, a necessity for extreme workloads like big data analysis or AI. This makes it possible for VMs running on Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 to run at nearly bare metal speeds, offering additional performance and efficiency for demanding applications.

– Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 provides a new high performance VM option, which is designed to streamline the process of configuring a high-performing VM, a necessity for extreme workloads like big data analysis or AI. This makes it possible for VMs running on Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 to run at nearly bare metal speeds, offering additional performance and efficiency for demanding applications. GPU Virtualization – With support for NVIDIA virtual GPU solutions, Red Hat Virtualization environments have the power to support more graphics and compute-intensive applications in a virtual environment in an organization’s preferred location and connected device.

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Cross-portfolio integration and Red Hat Virtualization Suite

Open integration is a key tenet of Red Hat Virtualization. The latest release delivers deeper integration across the Red Hat portfolio, including Red Hat Ansible Automation, Red Hat Gluster Storage, Red Hat CloudForms, Red Hat OpenStack Platform, and Red Hat Satellite. Additionally, Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 introduces Red Hat Virtualization Suite. Comprised of Red Hat Virtualization and Red Hat CloudForms, the suite manages heterogeneous environments across multiple clouds, hypervisors, containers and traditional computing infrastructure.

Partner ecosystem expansion

Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 expands on its robust partner ecosystem, providing additional IT management and configuration options for customers, including new integration capabilities driven by NVIDIA and Cisco. Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 offers Cisco ACI integration, which delivers benefits in network and segmentation automation. Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 is now also supported with NVIDIA virtual GPU (vGPU), enabling customers to deliver enhanced performance to remote users while helping to maximize physical infrastructure utilization.

Availability

Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 is available as a standalone offering, as an integrated offering with Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and as part of Red Hat Cloud Suite or Red Hat Virtualization Suite. Existing subscribers can upgrade to Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 through the Red Hat Customer Portal.

Supporting Quotes

Gunnar Hellekson, director, product management, Linux and Virtualization, Red Hat

"Red Hat Virtualization allows our customers to access the economics, performance and agility they need from their virtualized infrastructure. With enhancements in Red Hat Virtualization 4.2 including improved user interface, user-managed networking, disaster recovery features and tighter integration with the rest of Red Hat’s portfolio, we expect organizations to find it even easier to use and manage Red Hat Enterprise Linux hypervisor."

Gary Chen, research manager, Software Defined Compute, IDC

"The cost and complexity of today’s IT environment, coupled with the growing number of cloud native enterprise application environments, continues to be a challenge for many organizations. For organizations to find success in this market, they need a virtualization solution that can deliver a robust set of services for both traditional and new applications while delivering more operational efficiency."

Anne Hecht, senior director, NVIDIA Virtual GPU Product Marketing, NVIDIA

"As virtual client computing continues to grow, forward-thinking customers can now take advantage of Red Hat Virtualization with the increased flexibility and efficiency that GPU-accelerated VDI provides. NVIDIA Quadro Virtual Data Center Software delivers the enhanced performance for professional engineering and design applications, and NVIDIA GRID virtual PC enables a native-like experience for common office workloads, which are becoming more graphics -intensive."