February 22, 2016

KVM for IBM z Systems V1.1.1 and KVM survey

Together with the z13s IBM also announced the next version KVM for IBM z Systems V1.1.1 (search for 1.1.1 in the announcement). It will be available March 18, 2016. Here are some of the enhancements it will offer:
  • Simultaneous multi threading (SMT) support in the host. The guests don't see the difference
  • Support for the Vector Facility introduced in z13(s) (SIMD) to accelerate string operations and calculations
  • Hypervisor enhancements including support for iSCSI and NFS
  • Unattended installation capability of hypervisor for ease of installation
As this new product is continue to evolve at a fast pace, IBM has put up a survey for everyone interested to provide their input.

For the popular UI virt-manager a "howto build" is available. 

(updated 2/25/2016)