Both companies exceeded the Street's expectations last quarter. Now... how to close '08 with a bang?VMware is offering promos for 4Q targeting new SMB customers, while Citrix has released a new rev of XenServer. Both companies are looking for a strong finish to the year as customer purse strings draw tight. Virtualization is one way to do more with less, whether it's squeezing performance out of existing hardware, reducing rack space and utility consumption, or trying to improve operational flexibility.

I received a sales post (not a press release, but a standard customer ad) offering me $5,100 off a VMware Infrastructure Midsize Pack, a kit incorporating VirtualCenter plus three Infrastructure Enterprise licenses, 30 training credits, and sundry tasty bits like VMotion, Storage VMotion, and Resource Scheduler. So, list price of $19,595 - $5,100 = $14,495, plus requisite service contracts. The bundled training credits sweeten the pot for newbies and existing customers looking to grow their VMware investment. A deal must be signed by Xmas Eve to get the discount.

On the other side of the fence, the recently released Xenserver 5 Enterprise Edition will set you back $8,580 for three licenses, plus recurring support costs. Included this time around: High Availability as well as HA for management functions, where any Xen host can take up the management reins for the cluster. You can watch a decent flash interview of Simon Crosby, CTO, in the what's new section of the product site. Crosby manages to avoid saying VMware while comparing feature sets and his competition; Citrix's healthy Microsoft relationship does come through. Training? A quick browse shows a 2-day v5.0 class running $2,195.

Better starter pricing on VMware Infrastructure.

A more enterprise-y XenServer Enterprise Edition.

Looking at your bundled Hyper-Vness and wondering what all the fuss is about? Stay tuned to InformationWeek; we'll be running a head-to-head review of VM hosting environments this winter. XenServer is up first in the lab...Both companies exceeded expectations for the last quarter. Now... how to close '08 with a bang?