Proxmox 8.4 Release - Update with backup API
Proxmox Virtual Environment (Proxmox VE) gained popularity in recent years, as it offers an alternative Virtual Machine infrastructure, compared to VMware. Proxmox GmbH used opportunities generated in the wake of Broadcom's takeover of VMware to increase its market share and to drive development of their product with a focus on enterprise grade features. Their newest release 8.4 is a step further down this road.
Live migration using mediated devices
Using "Mediated Devices", physical devices can be shared to several virtual machines. Proxmox GmbH mentions GPU-devices, especially those from NVIDIA. Typical GPU applications such as AI come into mind, or anything else which is able to run workloads optimized for GPUs. If several Hosts of a cluster use the same GPU hardware, then Virtual Machines can be live migrated even if they use mediated devices.
This guarantees uninterrupted performance of amentioned workloads, which will be a boon to professional users with relevant use cases.
Third party backup API
Another API was added to the API library - an API for backups. This allows for seamless integration of backups into the main interface of Proxmox VE. Veeam already went forward to integrate Proxmox VE into its backup solutions: https://www.veeam.com/products/virtual/proxmox-backup-recovery.html.
It is safe to assume that Veeam cooperates with Proxmox GmbH for further progress, and it will be possible to administer backups from the GUI of Proxmox VE itself. It is also to be expected that other vendors will follow, which will further ease migration away from other virtual environments.
Shared directories between host and guest using virtiofs
VirtualBox, an virtual environment which is often used in desktop environments, supports to share directories between the guest and host. This can be realized with KVM, which is used by Proxmox, too, and could now be set up using the Proxmox VE GUI using "Mapped Directories". This could be used as an easy way to share files between several guests.
Warning
This approach does not scale well and should only be used for small/limited use cases, as it is not optimized for high throughput and concurrent writes.
Package updates
Adding to the updates already mentioned, Proxmox GmbH supplies newer packages of qemu and other packages used by Proxmox VE; for instance, native Debian Bookworm itself uses qemu 9.0, while Proxmox VE uses 9.2.
Being able to upgrade specific packages shows an advantage of Open Source and especially Debian - Proxmox developers are able to use Debian mostly unchanged and replace what they need, making use of Debian's stability on the one hand and newer versions on the other.
Conclusion
Proxmox shows that it continues on its road to a more professional, enterprise ready Proxmox VE. We value live migration of mediated devices as most important part of the relase for professional end users, as it opens up the possibility of having specific, GPU using workload being live migrated - thus allowing for an interruption free performance.
We also expect to see better support by established backup vendors.
Shared directories won't be as important especially in large infrastructures, but may provide an easy solution in small environments, if, say, a quick solution for shared read only access to a file library is needed.
Would you like to learn more about Proxmox? Feel free to contact me.
Philip Röder, Head of Business Development & Consulting
Phone +49 162 4196789
