IT systems have revolutionised the way businesses are run, but they’ve also created a difficult paradox; the more applications you need, the more server hardware resources you will require. However most servers use only a small fraction of their overall processing capabilities and as network gets larger and more complex, the servers begin to take up a lot of physical space. A data centre might become overcrowded with racks of servers consuming a lot of power and generating heat.

Server virtualisation (hypervisor) addresses these issues by combing the functions of ten or more existing systems into just one physical server. There’s no slowdown in performance – in fact, newer virtualised servers usually run faster than old ones – but you will notice the extra floor space, reduced power consumption, better utilisation of server hardware resources and lower demand for services such as air conditioning.

ESXi:

VMware ESXi 5 is a bare-metal hypervisor, meaning it installs directly on top of the physical server and partitions it into multiple virtual machines that can run simultaneously, sharing the physical resources of the underlying server. ESXi 5 delivers industry-leading performance and scalability while setting a new bar for reliability, security and hypervisor management efficiency.

Xen Server:

Citrix XenServer is a complete, managed server virtualisation platform built on the powerful Xen hypervisor. XenServer accelerates virtual desktop performance and reduces costs with IntelliCache, which uses local storage to cache boot images and non-persistent data for XenDesktop deployments. XenServer is also designed for efficient management of windows and linux virtual servers and delivers cost-effective server consolidation and business continuity.

Hyper-V:

Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 is the hypervisor-based server virtualisation product that allows you to consolidate workloads onto a single physical server. Hyper-V Server contains only the windows hypervisor, windows Server driver model, and virtualization components; it provides a small footprint and minimal overhead.

Benefits:

• Reduce your power, cooling and hardware related costs
• Reduce carbon footprint
• Better management
• Improve Scalability and Performance
• Increases IT agility and efficiency
• Improve business continuity and disaster recovery

If you thinking of virtualisation and not sure of the best approach then let Netpros audit your existing server environment and demonstrate how much you could save through virtualisation.