It is designed for enterprise-level virtualization, offering features such as live migration, high availability, and centralized management.
Team Lead for research and development at HBM
A robust virtualization solution providing flexibility and features like live migration and high availability
Pros and Cons
- "It is highly esteemed for its ability to efficiently optimize and enhance the operational speed and responsiveness of virtualized environments."
- "Incorporating analytics related to performance, particularly within the dashboard interface, would be beneficial."
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
It is highly esteemed for its ability to efficiently optimize and enhance the operational speed and responsiveness of virtualized environments. It offers exceptional performance benefits.
What needs improvement?
The integration aspect may benefit from some enhancement. Incorporating analytics related to performance, particularly within the dashboard interface, would be beneficial.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using it for two years.
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I would rate its stability capabilities eight out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Scalability abilities are impressive, I would rate it nine out of ten.
How are customer service and support?
They provide excellent support services, I would rate it nine out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Positive
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straightforward.
What about the implementation team?
The installation takes just a few minutes, it is very prompt.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I have heard from my colleague that it comes with a high price tag. I would rate it five out of ten.
What other advice do I have?
Overall, I would rate nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: System integrator
Chief Executive Officer CEO at IT CROWD S.A.S
Robust, mature, and easy to set up
Pros and Cons
- "It's a very mature product."
- "The solution is at its end of life and is about to be discontinued."
What is our primary use case?
Clients who have two or more servers and want to virtualize their processes can deploy Oracle VM, the Virtual Machine. It's comparable with something called hard partitioning so that they can comply with Oracle's licensing policies.
There are other products in the market from other vendors, however, those virtualization technologies are not certified with Oracle regarding their licensing policies. Oracle VM comes with something specific called hard partitioning, which has to physically update the CPU core to virtual machines. This is very important. It allows virtual machines to comply with Oracle licensing policies. Otherwise, we can have big issues regarding product licensing.
What is most valuable?
Oracle VM as a product is very complete. All the features that come with Oracle VM are available within a single subscription. There are no hidden costs. Every feature that you want to use can be used without any hesitation. For example, if there are other products in the market, other virtualization products, they start selling only the basic module, then, if you want some feature they tell you, "No, you have to purchase another module for this feature". In Oracle VM, that is not the case. There is one subscription, one product, and it's everything you need.
One of the features that we like in Oracle VM is live virtual machine migration. A virtual machine is either running on one physical server and can be moved from that physical server to another physical server live without shutting it down. That is the best part for us.
Apart from that, the graphical process that happens in the Oracle VM environment is also a great feature.
It's a very mature product.
The setup process is easy.
We find the solution to be stable.
The pricing of the product is great.
Technical support is always helpful and responsive.
What needs improvement?
The solution is at its end of life and is about to be discontinued. Whatever it is there today, version 3.4.7, that's the last version that will be issued. They are now done with it completely.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability on offer is very good. There are no bugs or glitches. it doesn't crash or freeze. It's very mature.
It is the best virtualization platform hypervisor that is out there. Oracle itself has used Oracle VM in all its engineer systems, as well as in the past generation of Oracle Cloud. It's very stable and very robust.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's a highly scalable product. They have deployed a server form of 1,000 servers with Oracle VM.
It's totally scalable. For example, today you have some generation like Intel generation processor, and after three, four, five years, you want to add new servers to the same Oracle VM environment. However, you now have the next generation, like maybe Intel servers, Intel processors, Generation 10, whatever it is. You can still mix different Intel generation processors in the same Oracle VM consideration. From that point of view, it is totally scalable. It allows different CPU generations.
At this time, we have more than 100 to 200 clients that have installed Oracle VM. The solution likely has millions of clients.
How are customer service and support?
Regarding the support from Oracle, it's the topmost quality and leading the market of VM products. It's always very good. We've been very happy with their capabilities and support.
How was the initial setup?
The implementation process is very straightforward. It is very user-friendly and it is very well-documented.
The deployment process can be handled by one or two people. It's a total single product. It's a single product that needs to be installed on the physical servers. On the station side, just you have to install Oracle VM Manager, and that's it.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Clients who use the solution pay for a subscription. Oracle VM and Oracle Linux, they're not sold as a license. However, they have support subscription. It is so cheap. It's almost 3% cheaper than any other virtualization product that is there in the market. There are many clients who use it exclusively for virtualization; they have converted their existing virtualization solution to Oracle VM.
What other advice do I have?
We're a partner, a reseller, of Oracle VM.
Oracle VM is basically an infrastructure product. It needs to be installed on-premise. For the cloud, Oracle VM is not applicable as Oracle itself virtualizes everything and provides for the clients. With Oracle VM, we have deployed it to our client infrastructure on-premise in all instances.
This product now is more than 12 to 15 years old. It has been in the market for a long time. Oracle has announced the end of life of this product. Soon, it is going to be finished. Next year, they're not going to launch any more versions of Oracle VM.
Right now, there is no advice that I can give as the product is at the end of life. If a company has Oracle VM in their environment, it is good to have an Oracle VM patch to the latest version and to keep it stable, and that's it. It's not going to be distributed anymore after next year.
I'd rate the solution at a ten out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Oracle VM
November 2024
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Oracle virtual machine templates for rapid deployment are very useful
What is our primary use case?
We are building a private cloud with Oracle VM. We want to implement Oracle RAC with Clusterware releases 12.2 and 18c, and with Oracle Database releases 11.2.0.4 to 18c.
How has it helped my organization?
We will implement a full dev/test environment with Oracle RAC and standalone databases. We will be able to fully use our ULA license agreement with Oracle and provide flexibility to our development teams.
What is most valuable?
Oracle virtual machine templates for rapid deployment are very useful. This allows us to deploy already-implemented and optimized virtual machines.
What needs improvement?
Snapshotting could be easier. And there could be more intuitive ways for cloning of virtual machines.
For how long have I used the solution?
Still implementing.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Storage Engineer at Comtrade Group
Provides efficient features for the live migration of VMs, but the network virtualization functionality needs improvement
Pros and Cons
- "It is a stable product that has been reliable for several years."
- "The product could improve network virtualization and hardware utilization functionalities."
What is our primary use case?
Our clients primarily use Oracle VM for test databases, web, and application services. It serves as a versatile tool in our top solutions.
What is most valuable?
The platform's most valuable feature is that it is free of charge. It is a stable product that has been reliable for several years. Its remote solution, live migration of VMs, and integration capabilities are also noteworthy.
What needs improvement?
The product could improve network virtualization and hardware utilization functionalities.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Oracle VM for about two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is stable, but there can be performance issues, particularly with network cards and device registration. Expanding storage can also be problematic. However, these issues can be managed effectively with proper knowledge and maintenance.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution is scalable. You can add servers to the cluster and integrate them into the existing system without major issues. The process is straightforward if you are familiar with the system.
How are customer service and support?
We use the free version of Oracle VM, which does not include direct support. However, it provides sufficient documentation and resources on its website. It has adequately maintained our systems since our use is not critical.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Previously, we used VM from Red Hat, but we switched to Oracle VM because it is a newer type of virtualization OEM and is quite stable. It is a free product, which is a significant advantage for us. While it may not be as suitable for critical systems, it is useful for non-critical applications.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is easy. The installation guide and knowledge base provided by Oracle are useful. We can find all the necessary information for deployment if we do not require support.
The deployment time depends on the complexity of the setup. A standard deployment involving one machine and one storage unit takes about one day. We require two engineers: one for initial equipment setup and another for system deployment and configuration.
What other advice do I have?
Oracle VM offers features such as live migration of VMs, remote solutions, online memory expansion, and integration with various systems. Despite some issues with network virtualization and hardware performance, these functionalities make it a good solution for many use cases.
I rate it a seven out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller
Last updated: Sep 6, 2024
Flag as inappropriateSenior Oracle DBA at a financial services firm with 11-50 employees
Has minimal system downtime and provides the ability to run multiple instances simultaneously
Pros and Cons
- "It provides reliable virtualization that supports our operational needs without significant performance issues."
- "The product's user interface could be more intuitive for less experienced users."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use it in our PCI industry solutions and for Oracle middleware, which connects applications to Oracle databases and provides web services.
What is most valuable?
The product's most valuable feature is the ability to run multiple instances of the same product in testing environments before moving them to production.
What needs improvement?
The product's user interface could be more intuitive for less experienced users. Improved monitoring and reporting on storage usage would benefit better resource management.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Oracle VM for two years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The product has been stable with minimal downtime. I rate the stability a nine.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Besides administrators, we have developers and testers using Oracle VM for application testing and development. It scales well to meet our increasing demands. We don't plan significant increases as our current usage meets our business needs.
I rate the scalability a nine out of ten.
How was the initial setup?
Around five administrators handle various aspects like database, network, and system administration in terms of product maintenance.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing for the platform is aligned with other enterprise virtualization solutions.
What other advice do I have?
The platform's networking and database support are crucial for us. We also utilize Oracle Cloud for both production and testing environments. It provides reliable virtualization that supports our operational needs without significant performance issues. We can manage virtual machines remotely, which is essential for our data center operations.
It's a good choice if you're already invested in Oracle software, but other virtualization solutions might be preferable if you're not.
I rate it a nine out of ten.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Last updated: Jun 28, 2024
Flag as inappropriateEnterprise Architect at Assore
A great tool for complex organizations, reliable, and expands easily
Pros and Cons
- "It's easy to adjust the size up and down."
- "The pricing could be cheaper. It is very pricey."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use it for ERP in virtual environments.
What is most valuable?
The solution is very scalable. It's easy to adjust the size up and down.
It's stable.
It's a great tool for complex organizations.
What needs improvement?
The pricing could be cheaper. It is very pricey.
This tool isn't for every company. It's very complex.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been working with the solution for nine years, more or less.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability has been great. There are no bugs or glitches and it doesn't crash or freeze. It has been reliable. I would rate the scalability at an eight out of ten. We have external partners and an internal technical team that constantly works to stabilize everything.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability is very good. You can adjust it up and down. The scalability I would rate at a ten out of ten. It's great.
We have 250 users on the solution right now. Their job titles vary from senior to middle management. It's pretty static. We do not have plans to increase usage.
How are customer service and support?
We've worked with technical support. We supplement it with our technical expertise.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We did not previously use a different solution.
How was the initial setup?
The setup is pretty straightforward. It doesn't require any maintenance once it is up and running.
It took about three weeks to set up the VM itself, however, Oracle in general takes a long time to implement - maybe six months.
I wasn't directly involved in the deployment process and cannot speak to how it was done.
We have 36 technical staff that help handle the deployment and maintenance.
What about the implementation team?
We had an integrator install the solution for us.
What was our ROI?
There may be an ROI, however, it may not be a lot. It's a very expensive tool.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We currently pay yearly licensing for the solution.
it is an expensive solution.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We currently are in the decision-making process of whether we're going to remain with Oracle or whether we're going to look at a different ERP.
What other advice do I have?
We use an older version of the solution. While the solution started as an on-premises deployment, we've since moved to a private cloud. We did that in the last 18 months.
This is a very complex system for complex organizations. It is not something I would recommend to everyone.
I'd rate the solution ten out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Senior Database Administrator at a consumer goods company with 10,001+ employees
The templates that are available for provisioning database nodes are very helpful. Using these pre-configured templates makes the deployment process quick and efficient.
What is most valuable?
We are using Oracle VM as the platform for running our Oracle databases. The templates that are available for provisioning database nodes are very helpful. Using these pre-configured templates makes the deployment process quick and efficient.
How has it helped my organization?
By virtualizing our database tier on generic x86 hardware, it lowered hardware costs, improved performance, scalability and maintainability. We now have more redundancy than we had with proprietary hardware.
What needs improvement?
Ease of upgrades is certainly a strong candidate for improvement. I started looking at an Oracle 12 template and I have to say I liked the Oracle 11 template better, not from a database perspective but from an OS perspective.
For how long have I used the solution?
We initially implemented version 2.2.1 in 2010 but never took it in to production. We had issues with stability that were ultimately traced to how the LUNs were presented to the guests. We went live with version 3.0 in 2011. We're currently on version 3.2.1.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
We've had no issues with deployment.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability was a major issue initially and it was traced to how the LUNs were presented to the guests. Once that was resolved, the system was pretty solid.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I did have an issue with the guests running out of swap space and located a procedure to expand swap space without having to disrupt the LUN numbering convention.
How are customer service and technical support?
Customer Service:
It was initially subpar.
Technical Support:It was initially subpar. The issue with LUN presentation was discovered by us and not by tech support. I would think tech support would have been able to at least point us in that direction. Lately, it has been difficult to route issues to the correct group. Once there, however, support has been adequate.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
For our database tier, we used proprietary hardware that worked well but we were limited to that type of hardware and it was reaching end-of-life. At the time, Oracle was adamant about their hypervisor being the only one that was license-compliant, so that took us in the direction of Oracle VM. I understand Oracle has backed away from that stance for other hypervisors, but at the time we didn’t want to double or quadruple or database licensing costs.
How was the initial setup?
Unfortunately, I used my VMware experience and applied it to the Oracle VM setup. Looking back, that was probably not the right approach as some things in Oracle VM are very different. The LUN presentation issue came down to poor documentation as there were two ways to present the LUNs and the documentation made it seem the improper method was the way to go.
What about the implementation team?
We did it in-house, but ultimately had to get Oracle involved for the initial implementation. The version we are currently on is very stable. I should probably consider upgrading, but it’s a lower priority task right now.
What was our ROI?
The ROI was very low considering that the initial license was free.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Support costs are manageable.
What other advice do I have?
As a hypervisor, it is effective, however the functionality is a step down from VMware. Upgrades are getting easier to do, but still not as easy as VMware.
The current versions seem much more stable than the earlier ones. The best advice I have is to understand the documentation and don’t take prior experience with other hypervisors in to account.
A typical database node-guest configuration:
The disks for the O/S and swap are configured as Virtual Disks while the LUNs for ASM are configured as Physical Disks.
The environment was configured primarily to host our PeopleSoft implementation as well as several smaller databases. However, PeopleSoft is being replaced with another ERP solution so this environment will be used for historical purposes. The future of the other databases is yet to be determined.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Head of IT and Senior Site Reliability Engineer and IT Ops Engineer at Padrão do Fonseca
Straightforward to set up, stable, and has no cost
Pros and Cons
- "The Foundation is the most valuable feature of Oracle VM."
- "The documentation for implementation could be improved because we were not able to find an easy way to implement our company's features due to a lack of understanding."
What is our primary use case?
We are using Oracle VM for containers, developing testing, and Kubernetes.
How has it helped my organization?
Oracle VM helps us with the development of proposals.
What is most valuable?
The Foundation is the most valuable feature of Oracle VM.
What needs improvement?
The documentation for implementation could be improved because we were not able to find an easy way to implement our company's features due to a lack of understanding.
For how long have I used the solution?
I am currently using Oracle VM.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Oracle VM is stable.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We previously used VMware. However, I did not have the ability to use VMware in my tech environment. Since we made a contract with Oracle for our database solution and cloud services, we thought that it would be a good idea to try Oracle VM.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straightforward. The deployment took one hour and required three people.
What about the implementation team?
The implementation was completed in-house.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The solution is free but we have to pay for technical support.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We evaluated other solutions but they were all expensive.
What other advice do I have?
I give Oracle VM an eight out of ten.
I suggest signing a contract for the technical support for Oracle VM because it lacks documentation and can be difficult to find information.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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