By Tony Nunn, Global Solutions Architect, Edge Transformation, Workplace Productivity
As organizations adopt more flexible and dynamic work models, knowledge workers rely on virtualized systems to perform tasks ranging from data analysis to collaborative content creation. Omnissa Horizon is a powerful solution that provides a unified workspace for such tasks. By deploying it on HPE VM Essentials, businesses can leverage a cost-effective and scalable hypervisor, enabling efficient resource allocation and enhanced accessibility.
What is HPE VM Essentials Software?
HPE VM Essentials is a virtualization management suite designed to streamline the deployment, monitoring, and management of virtual machines (VMs).
The introduction of HPE VM Essentials follows HPE’s acquisition of Morpheus Data, aiming to unify and simplify IT operations for customers. This solution represents the initial step in integrating Morpheus capabilities across the HPE portfolio, providing a cohesive virtualization management experience.
HPE VM Essentials Software is a comprehensive virtualization solution designed to simplify the management of virtual environments while reducing operational costs and complexities. Leveraging a KVM-based hypervisor, it offers a cost-effective alternative for hosting virtualized workloads, enabling organizations to optimize their IT infrastructure.
By utilizing the embedded operation suite within Morpheus, administrators can provision and manage both KVM (HPE VME) and VMware-based virtual machines from a single, intuitive interface, streamlining operations and reducing the need for multiple management tools.
The software supports advanced features such as live migration, allowing running virtual machines to move between physical hosts without downtime. It also offers high availability, automatically restarting VMs on another host in case of a failure, ensuring workload resiliency.
HPE VM Essentials intelligently schedules VM placement within its cluster based on real-time resource utilization, optimizing performance and host utilization.
With a user-friendly provisioning wizard and REST API support, IT administrators can quickly deploy VMs. The solution integrates with IP Address Management (IPAM), Domain Name System (DNS) solutions, and automation tools like Bash and PowerShell to streamline additional provisioning steps.
The software integrates seamlessly with external storage solutions, including NFS, iSCSI, and Fibre Channel, allowing organizations to leverage existing infrastructure investments.
For an overview and further insights into HPE VM Essentials Software, watch HPE VM Essentials Software.
VM Essentials Management Console
From the provisioning tab within the HPE VM Essentials console, we can create and list VM instances deployed on the hypervisor.
Provisioning VM instances
HPE VM Essentials comprises several key technologies and tools, each contributing unique capabilities.
HPE Morpheus Software
HPE Morpheus Software is a multi-cloud management platform integrated into HPE VM Essentials software. It simplifies and unifies VM management across on-premises, private cloud, and public cloud environments. Key features include:
- Unified management: Morpheus provides a single pane of glass for managing VM provisioning, automation, and lifecycle tasks.
- Self-service portals: It enables developers and IT teams to self-deploy VMs and applications within governance frameworks.
- Automation: Morpheus supports powerful automation workflows, allowing users to orchestrate tasks across their infrastructure.
- Cost optimization: With built-in analytics, Morpheus helps organizations monitor resource usage and reduce cloud expenses.
-
Integration support: Morpheus connects seamlessly with tools like Terraform, Ansible, and Kubernetes, enabling hybrid and multi-cloud flexibility.
Deployment and compatibility
HPE VM Essentials software is compatible with HPE ProLiant Gen11 servers running Ubuntu 22.04. It requires a minimum of 8GB RAM for non-hyperconverged deployments, with additional memory needed based on data disk configurations. A minimum of 50GB storage is recommended for the operating system, and a 10 Gbps network interface is advised for optimal performance.
The software is available under various licensing terms, including a per-socket three-year electronic license (E-LTU), providing flexibility to suit different organizational needs.
Deployment criteria for Omnissa Horizon qualification
Prior to commencing the deployment process, the following prerequisites are needed:
Hardware requirements
- A server or high-performance PC capable of hosting the Morpheus KVM hypervisor (generationally current or relevant’ server capable of supporting the above Morpheus Ubuntu KVM build as of time of writing)
- Minimum of 16 GB RAM, 500 GB SSD storage, and a multi-core CPU with virtualization support
Software Requirements
- Latest version of HPE VM Essentials (Morpheus KVM hypervisor)
- Omnissa Horizon installation package
- Windows 11 Pro or Enterprise installed on the client machine
Network configuration
- A stable LAN or WAN setup for seamless communication between the hypervisor and client machine
- Static IPs or a dynamic DNS setup
Administrative access
- Root access to the HPE VM Essentials console (Morpheus KVM server)
- Administrative permissions to the Omnissa Horizon deployment
- Administrative privileges on the Windows 11 client machine
The evaluation build
For our evaluation of Omnissa Horizon upon HPE VM Essentials, a Windows 11 instance was created, comprised of a 4-cores vCPU, 16 GB of RAM and 120 GB of allocated storage.
The deployment consisted of a manual pool of registered non-vSphere virtual machines (VMs).
Configured Windows 11 instance
The host platform was comprised of these hardware and software elements:
Hardware
- HPE ProLiant DL380 server hardware
- HPE Alletra MP B10000 storage
Software
- HPE VM Essentials version 8.01
- Omnissa Horizon version 8.13.1 (Build 11490723527)
Omnissa Horizon client
HPE VM Essentials Dashboard
As you can see from the below images, the Morpheus KVM hypervisor, a core component of HPE VM Essentials, is recognised by Windows 11 as being the manufacturer provision for this operating system.
Windows PowerShell output
Windows system information
Determining performance
As mentioned earlier, the intention of this evaluation lab configuration is to determine the viability of a knowledge worker use case when hosting a desktop instance on a platform built from HPE hardware running both HPE VM Essentials hypervisor and Omnissa Horizon VDI infrastructure.
As such, simulating potential load and performance for that of a standard back-office persona, this test was conducted using a streaming video workload delivered from within Edge Explorer.
As you can see from the below screenshots, even under duress, the desktop instance continued to support and perform adequately without issue.
Windows 11 Performance Monitor
Performance monitoring was conducted both natively from within Windows performance monitor (Perfmon) and additionally using Horizon performance monitor.
Horizon Performance Monitor
The outputs clearly illustrate that even while the platform was not configured to support graphically intensive applications, given the lack of installed GPU, it is more than capable of delivering a quality of experience suitable for that of a standard knowledge worker.
Given that this installation was built using an incubation deployment directly tied to the product’s development phase, it still lacks some of the key functionality required to support much more resource-intensive use cases, such as those of engineering, developer, or trader personas.
All have a prerequisite reliance on GPU support and high availability underpinnings.
It must, however, be highlighted that while GPU support within HPE VM Essentials software is currently unavailable, this is, in fact, on the roadmap for future releases.
How can HPE and Omnissa potentially bridge the gap over the course of the maturity roadmap for the future development of this solution?
The solution is to leverage the brokering capabilities of Omnissa Horizon to further enhance the existing features and functionality of HPE VM Essentials software.
One innovative approach is the deployment of Omnissa Horizon as a brokering layer on top of the HPE VM Essentials software hypervisor. This combination leverages the best of both worlds, marrying robust hypervisor capabilities with sophisticated brokering functionality. Here, we’ll look at the potential benefits, key features, and functionalities of this potential integrated solution.
Omnissa Horizon acting as an intelligent brokering layer that connects users with virtual resources hosted on the HPE VM Essentials hypervisor, provides these key functionalities:
- Centralized access: Providing a single portal for users to access virtual desktops and applications
- Load balancing: Dynamically allocating resources based on demand, ensuring optimal performance
- User profile management: Supporting personalized experiences by managing user sessions, preferences, and security policies
- Security and compliance: Enhancing access control and auditing capabilities across the virtual environment.
But what are the benefits of a combined approach?
- Streamlined user experience: By using Omnissa Horizon as a broker, organizations can offer users a unified interface to access their virtual desktops and applications. This not only simplifies the user experience but also reduces the time required for login and resource discovery.
- Enhanced resource utilization: With intelligent load balancing and dynamic resource allocation, Omnissa Horizon helps ensure that virtual machines on the HPE VMware Essentials hypervisor are optimally used. This helps in minimizing idle resources and reducing operational costs.
- Simplified management and administration: Administrators benefit from a centralized management console that integrates with the HPE VM Essentials hypervisor environment.
- Scalability and flexibility: This integrated solution is designed to grow with your business needs. As demand increases, both the hypervisor and the brokering layer can scale, ensuring that new users and applications are seamlessly integrated without disrupting existing services.
- Cost efficiency: Reducing operational complexity and optimizing resource allocation can often translate into significant cost savings. This simplified management approach reduces the administrative burden and minimizes the need for extensive IT support, while better resource utilization lowers the overall capital expenditure.
Seamless integration with HPE VMware Essentials Software
The tight integration between Omnissa Horizon and HPE VMware Essentials ensures users can log in once and access multiple resources without re-authentication, thanks to single sign-on (SSO) capabilities.
- Aggregate monitoring across both layers provides a comprehensive view of performance and resource utilization.
- Simplify troubleshooting via a centralized log and event management system helping to quickly identify and resolve issues.
- Security is paramount in any virtual environment. This integrated solution offers multi-factor authentication (MFA) enhancing security during user login.
- Role-based access control (RBAC), limiting access to critical resources based on user roles and profiles.
- Audit trails, providing detailed logs helping to meet regulatory requirements and performing forensic analysis when needed.
- Administrators can leverage built-in analytics to monitor user behavior, tracking usage patterns to predict peak loads and adjust resource allocation accordingly.
- Optimized performance, using historical data to fine-tune the environment for maximum efficiency.
- Forecast capacity planning for future expansion based on trends and predictive modelling.
As remote work becomes the norm, organizations need solutions that offer robust performance across dispersed locations. The combination of HPE VMware Essentials software and Omnissa Horizon helps ensure that remote employees have secure, fast, reliable access to corporate resources from anywhere.
For businesses that need to deliver complex applications to a distributed workforce, the integration offers:
- Efficient application deployment: Simplified distribution and updates
- Optimized performance: Dynamic resource allocation to meet application demands
- Enhanced user experience: Reduced latency and faster load times
Furthermore, Omnissa Horizon enhances the previously mentioned roadmap feature of GPU support, allocating GPUs dynamically to VMs based on demand, supporting both dedicated GPU passthrough and virtual GPU (vGPU) partitioning and managing multi-GPU workloads efficiently. This helps ensures that high-performance applications get the GPU power they need while optimizing resource sharing among VMs.
In conclusion
HPE VM Essentials in conjunction with Omnissa Horizon provides a commercially compelling alternative to running a knowledge worker use case on a hypervisor platform from one of the mainstream vendors such as Broadcom, Citrix, or Microsoft.
As the solution matures and inherits the functionality attributes required to accommodate more resource intensive use cases, it will further strengthen the end-to-end portfolio of service and platform offerings currently available from HPE.
To find out more about the services available from HPE, both in assessing the options on the various hypervisor vendors or the choice of hosting platform (private cloud, public cloud or hybrid) and the potential of conducting a proof of concept with HPE VM Essentials with Omnissa Horizon, please feel free to contact myself (Tony Nunn, nunn@hpe.com) or one of my colleagues.
Meet HPE Blogger Tony Nunn, Global Solutions Architect, Edge Transformation, Workplace Productivity
Cloud Services Experts
Hewlett Packard Enterprise
twitter.com/HPE_GreenLake
linkedin.com/showcase/hpe-greenlake/
hpe.com/us/en/greenlake
Cloud_Experts
HPE experts share their insights on how you can transform your business with HPE GreenLake edge-to-cloud platform – the cloud that comes to you, wherever your apps and data live.
