Hi all,

I've just installed CentOS 5.0 on two brand new server, and it's time for me to migrate a few virtual machines from the old servers. The old servers are running CentOS 4.4 + OpenVZ; I'm quite happy with this setup: fast safe and simple (for my experience as of now :) ) Also is very easy to migrate one virtual machine to a server to another for maintenance/reboots. I've also managed to setup a nightly rsync for backups and it's very fast (two pass: first rsync with virtual machine up; shutdown virtual machine; second rsync; restart virtual machine... all in a matter of minutes for a complete backup even on the biggest virtual machine with 12G of used disk space)

Now the dilemma: should I stay with OpenVZ or should I jump to Xen?

What I don't like of OpenVZ is the non-stock kernel; instead I like the easiness of management.

What I don't like of Xen is the slow restart and the disk management (either dedicated partition or image file) which can lead to slower backup and harder migration; instead I'm attracted by the standard and fully supported kernel.

Does anyone have experience on Xen and have advice on which could be the best compromise between the two solutions? Of course with Xen I have to start all over on learning but... hey I'm a Linux fan, I like to learn!

Many thanks and have a good day

Lorenzo Quatrini