KVM Reviews & Insights

Linux KVM is a powerful and free (in the case of using Ubuntu for example) virtualization tool. In our organization KVM plays a significant role in DevNet related implementations (especially by using in pair of network appliances + KVM with a variety of firewall/router/VPN box images). AT&T which is one of our carriers and the most well-known SP is also using KVM in its FlexWare environment (Juniper NFX hardware + KVM + vEX/vSRX images).

KVM is the best solution in the case you need to test and turn up any virtual environment with limited vCPU/RAM resources. The obvious area of its use is a network environment when we want to avoid being tied to one type of hardware/vendor and being able to swap from one instance to another with no downtimes. The use of a vSwitch (that supports VLAN tagging) is a significant bonus for network engineers that some other hypervisors do not provide.

We are using Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) as part of our storage solution (OpenStack based). Our solution provides low-cost disk volumes to researchers to use for archiving and data backup. The volumes are provided by KVM virtual machines orchestrated by OpenStack Cinder. It was easier to implement this solution with KVM than XenServer Hypervisor.

I recommend using KVM if you want to start a proof of concept of OpenStack services because it is very simple to configure and has much documentation about it. If your IT environment is Linux based, KVM is a great alternative to virtualize your infrastructure. It works with Windows virtual machines, but it is better with Linux obviously.