This article describes the hardware virtualization support for Microsoft SharePoint products and technologies.

Microsoft offers the following hardware virtualization software products:

• Microsoft Virtual PC
• Microsoft Virtual Server
• Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V

These products let you run multiple operating system instances at the same time on a single computer. In addition to the Microsoft hardware virtualization software products, support for third-party hypervisor technology is supported for hypervisor technologies that are certified by Microsoft through the Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP). For more information, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

Microsoft and some third parties have made various hardware virtualization software products available. A significant ongoing investment is required to certify a software product for use with these technologies. We have not fully tested or certified Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 2.0 and Microsoft SharePoint Portal Server 2003 as supportable for use under all hardware virtualization software products.

We have tested and certified Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 as supportable for use under Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 and Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V.

Support for third-party hypervisor technology

Deploying SharePoint Products and Technologies (Windows SharePoint Services v3 and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007) is supported on hypervisor technologies that are certified by Microsoft through the Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125649&clcid=0x409) .

For more information about third-party vendors, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Currently, you can use the following products together with hardware virtualization software products only for testing:

• Windows SharePoint Services
• SharePoint Portal Server 2003

You can use the following products together with hardware virtualization software products for production use:

• Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 - Virtualization is supported for production when you use Virtual Server 2005 R2, Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, and those certified by Microsoft through the Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125649&clcid=0x409) .
• Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 - Virtualization is supported for production when you use Virtual Server 2005 R2, Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, and those certified by Microsoft through the Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125649&clcid=0x409) .

For more information about deploying SharePoint Products and Technologies with Windows Server 2008 Hyper-v see the SharePoint prescriptive guidance at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125834&clcid=0x409 (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125834&clcid=0x409) .

For more information about the level of support that Premier and non-Premier customers can expect when they use third-party hardware virtualization software together with SharePoint products and technologies, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Support is provided for the following scenarios:

• Support will be provided on a commercially-reasonable-effort basis only for issues that occur with the 2003 version of SharePoint products and technologies in a virtual environment.
• Support will be provided for issues that occur with the 2007 version of SharePoint products and technologies for production only when you use Virtual Server 2005 R2, Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V, and those certified by Microsoft through the Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=125649&clcid=0x409) .

For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: