Zdnet has an interesting debate about Hyper-V 3 on Windows Server 8 vs. vSphere 5.0. Hyper-V to this point has been a great value play for organizations that didn’t have huge management requirements for their virtualized environment. It’s support for Linux has actually improved a lot as well.
But I think it’s unreasonable to think the Windows 8 will have an sizable impact on VMware’s market share in the short term (next 1 or so). I don’t see the argument for a OS that’s not scheduled to be released this year. Microsoft has a poor track record of delivering all the features shipped in beta as part of the production release. I just can’t see myself making a decision based on the promises of a not yet shipped product.
With that said, I look forward to the release of Windows 8 (client and server) and the push it will give VMware on both innovation and price. It’s time someone shook up the market and brought real competition to this space.