But the bad news is, after comparing four packages whose makers say do just that, we're still looking for an easier way out of cross-platform virtualization management hell.

The VM management packages we tested fell into two categories: add-ons to existing systems management platforms, and newer standalone packages. Systems Center Virtual Machine Manager (MS VMM) and Unicenter-based Network & Systems Management (NSM) with Advanced Systems Management (ASM) fell into the former; while TotalView and Virtual Resource Manager (VRM) fell into the latter.

The products varied wildly in their approach to the problem and each fell down in its own places.

•  Microsoft's SC VMM did well for Windows VM guests, and could get a grip on VMware's ESX platform -- but only if VMware's expensive VirtualCenter was also installed. SC VMM required Microsoft's Operations Manager to provide life-cycle management, but integrating and patching everything together into a working system proved difficult.

•  Likewise CA's graft of ASM and NSM onto our test network was wickedly difficult. NSM is a powerful, innately heterogeneous management package, and it could produce lots of data regarding our VM farm test simulation, but it stopped short in a number of areas including building and versioning VMs and discovering existing VM infrastructure.