Citrix just introduced the latest version of XenServer at its recent Citrix Synergy event, XenServer 7.5. The release, which is available for download now, is made to help users get the most out of their XenApp and XenDesktop deployments. The company put a heavy emphasis on user feedback when building the new update. Here are some of the most noticeable changes.
XenServer 7.5: Quadrupled pool size
Prior to this update, the XenServer pool size sat at 16 hosts. But now, XenServer 7.5 offers a pool size of 64 hosts. The ability to deploy these larger pools means that you’ll have fewer pools to manage overall, more flexible in-pool migration options, and increased flexibility when it comes to High Availability. It also means that you won’t have to create as many XenApp and XenDesktop machine catalogs to deploy images across multiple pools, potentially saving your organization plenty of time and effort.
Thin provisioning for block storage
XenServer 7.5 also enables reduced storage costs thanks to its new thin provisioning for block storage capabilities, which is an experimental option for GFS2 Storage Repositories. GFS2 is a Linux-based shared-disk file system created for block storage. In older versions of the Storage Repository, XenServer was only able to support thin provisioning of virtual disks for file-based storage types like NFS, SMB, and local storage. So this new capability with GFS2 gives you the ability to use thin provisioning for SANs.
Increased virtual disk sizes
With the new experimental support for GFS2 Storage repositories also comes an increased maximum size of virtual disks. In XenServer 7.5, the maximum size has been increased from 2TB to 16TB, giving you a better chance of satisfying your most pressing data requirements, including the ability to support large databases. This feature is currently in its testing phase. So you can try it out now using the XenServer command line interface.
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