VMware Super Consolidation and Virtualisation
"Enterprises should change their thinking about consolidation and pursue a server virtualization strategy rather than a server consolidation project". Gartner
VMware ESX
VMware pioneered server consolidation on commodity servers and have six years experience. ESX increases effective capacity without the need to buy new servers. Applications and infrastructure services on dedicated servers can be consolidated onto fewer, highly scalable and reliable enterprise-class servers. Multiple hardware configurations and operating systems can co-exist on the same hardware platform. VMware server software helps businesses: Utilise server capacity fully Deploy new services efficiently Simplify server management Manage computing resources strategically Reduce Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Boost ROI as server utilisation is vastly improved
Linux Migration
Many customers are seeing significant savings from hosting historically UNIX-based applications on Intelbased servers using Linux. Linux is rapidly becoming a realistic alternative to traditional proprietary hardware platforms like SUN and HP. Not only edge of network applications like web serving and firewalls, but high performance and high availability applications such as Oracle. Typically, like for like performance can be achieved by using Intel servers with Linux for as little as 25% of the cost of more expensive UNIX solutions.
VMware Virtual Infrastructure Virtual infrastructure provides an abstraction layer between the computing, storage and networking hardware, and the software that runs on it. Virtual infrastructure introduces a new type of infrastructure has never before been available. With Virtual Infrastructure, IT organizations can provision new services and change the amount of resources dedicated to a software service simply by interacting with a management console. Hardware management is completely separated from software management, and hardware can be treated as a single pool of processing, storage and networking power to be allocated and de-allocated to various software services on the fly. VMware's implementation of virtual infrastructure is based on virtual machine technology originally developed for mainframes allowing multiple operating systems to share a single piece of hardware. VMware pioneered virtual machines on the Intel platform, and has spent over six years enhancing their capabilities for general enterprise use. VMware is a standardized hardware image - implemented in software - that operating systems and applications run on. The exact same virtual hardware platform is presented to the operating system and its applications irrespective of the hardware platform it resides upon. By creating a uniform virtual hardware platform across the entire data center, virtual infrastructure allows software to be installed on or moved from one physical system to another without requiring reconfiguration of the operating system or applications. With VMware's groundbreaking VMotion technology, this move doesn't even cause an interruption in user service. Adopting Virtual infrastructure results in: 60-80% utilization rates for Intel servers up from today's 5-15% Just-in-time provisioning of additional resources to applications Provisioning times for new applications measured in seconds, not days Response times for change requests measured in minutes Zero-downtime hardware maintenance without waiting for maintenance windows Unified server provisioning, monitoring and resource allocation across multiple generations and editions of Windows, Linux and NetWare servers Guaranteed build consistency across systems Higher success rates for patch roll-outs Complete information on equipment counts, status and ownership
VMware benefits:
Business Continuity Reduce Redundancy with Virtual Machine Based Clustering Test Recovery from Backed-up Data Without Sourcing Hardware Failover Site Server Consolidation and Automation Run Multiple Operating Systems on the Same Physical Hardware Configure Development Environments on a Single Physical Platform Pre-Configure Libraries for Test and Development Environments Consolidating IT Infrastructure Servers Consolidating Mission Critical Servers Capacity Optimization with VMware Software on Blades
Customer Value Proposition
Consolidating idle server and storage resources and re-deploying those resources on new projects Increasing efficiency in operations Improving server management and mobility Improving service levels by providing zero-downtime maintenance Standardizing environments and improving security Decreasing recovery time in disaster situations Enabling high availability with less redundancy Adapting more efficiently to dynamic business requirements Advanced backup strategies Reducing costs in technical support and training
More Information
For further information please contact Alistair Wybrew on 020 8894 9000 or email alistair.wybrew@repton.co.uk, alternatively visit www.repton.co.uk