Coyote Point recently announced the release of their 8.0 Equalizer code for their load balancer/application delivery line. Coyote Point was kind enough to hook me up with a preview release of the 8.0 code, and I loaded it up on a pair of e350si’s and walked it through its paces to see what’s changed.
Functionally speaking, the 7.2 Coyote Point Web UI (or WUI) was always functional. However, aesthetically speaking the 7.2 interface was a little rough around the edges. Perfectly functional for what you needed to do, just a little utilitarian.
With the release of 8.0.0, they cleaned a lot of that up, and putting the entire package into a more aesthetically pleasing interface.
One of the nicest additions with the 8.0 is on the main page, which now shows performance metrics (Layer-4 and Layer-7).  In 7.2, these metrics were available, just a few clicks from the main page. Having them front and center is a welcome addition.
There is now an AJAX-style wizard for adding virtual clusters (virtual services) and servers. This is demonstrated in a quick look video, available below.
The 8.0.0 isn’t all looks, it also brings about some new functionality, including integration into VMWare server farms, support for the new e650si monster platform (21-port Gigabit Ethernet web switch), as well as support for a new line of acceleration cards, which they call “Xcel2″, which boosts the available SSL TPS.
I don’t have a mega VMWare server farm, so I was unable to test this new functionality, but it’s interesting as I start to see more and more virtualization beyond testing and development (my test web server is actually Ubuntu in Microsoft VirtualPC 2007).
Overall, the 8.0 is a significant upgrade for the Coyote Point line. You can check out what Coyote Point has to offer at http://www.coyotepoint.com.
