Top ten factors to consider for server virtualization

This article explains the top ten things to consider about server virtualization.

This article explains the top ten things to consider about server virtualization.

1. Performance

Why is handling loss so important? Because it affects the performance of the application and ultimately affects the customer's level of satisfaction. If the virtualization infrastructure is more expensive to handle, you can run only a product-or less-important application service. Due to the different products, the processing loss of the virtualization solution is from 1% to 60%. The efficiency of virtualization applications is very different, some can be close to the original physical environment operating efficiency, and some of the poor to the user's unacceptable degree. There are also significant differences in the performance of different products for the same virtualization technology route, but in general, virtualization hardware can cause significant performance loss, but operating system virtualization performance is extremely low and almost negligible.

2. Management Tools

Many users try virtualization because they can reduce hardware costs because the hardware in these data centers has only 15%~20% utilization. Although the cost of hardware and the environment itself is already considerable, the larger part of the management cost is still the management cost of the server. As a result, management tools are even more important for the management of virtualized infrastructure, and only the management and monitoring of resources are well managed to make effective use of the resources of virtual servers.

Each type of virtualization solution provides a very different management tool. Some virtualization solutions have few management tools and are very limited in their use. Some specific virtualization solutions offer a great set of tools and are packaged and promoted at discounted prices with products. However, some tools are very expensive and are often sold at the price of an optional product component.

3. Platform Support

Virtualization Technology Abstracts a virtual server from its hardware, but that does not mean that the virtual infrastructure can support any hardware. It is important to note that hardware virtualization and concurrent virtualization must support all hardware from a CPU chip to a computer such as a graphics card. While operating system virtualization is built on a standard operating system that supports all hardware supported by the operating system, it is easier for the operating system to virtualize the product deployment process.

4. Migration

Virtualization Technology Abstracts virtual Servers from hardware, and the biggest benefit is that virtual servers can migrate back and forth across different physical servers. Migration capability allows the virtual server to be cloned or migrated from one physical server to another.

Many virtualization solutions have cloning or migration capabilities, but they vary considerably in terms of software functionality, limitations, and costs. High-end 0 downtime solutions are costly to migrate and require the support of San centralized storage devices. In doing server migration, users need to evaluate the importance of migration, and how to better adapt to the enterprise application environment.

5. Resource Management

Three different virtualization technologies use different approaches to server resource allocation. Hardware virtualization technology and parallel virtualization technology are used to allocate virtual hardware resources to different virtual servers. These two technologies differ in their flexibility in allocating and replacing hardware resources. In fact, both of these technologies allocate virtual resources to virtual servers, and there are many limitations, such as the CPU and memory resources that can be allocated for allocation.

Operating system virtualization is very flexible in managing resources, allowing for real-time updating of resources without disrupting application services or virtual servers.

6. Isolation and security

For isolation and security issues, each virtualization technology is handled differently. The most basic component of a virtualization solution is partitioning. All virtual computers must be completely isolated so that processes, dynamic connection libraries, and applications do not affect applications on other virtual servers of the same server.

Compared to a normal server, because virtualization technology changes access nodes and different components, it is unlikely to perform a regular attack on the virtual server. As with isolation, security is equally important for two virtual servers on the same physical server.

7. Server Utilization

Increasing server utilization can significantly reduce the total cost of ownership of the data center. The cost factors that are primarily considered in a server consolidation project are data center storage, power, and hardware maintenance costs over the year. When assessing the resource utilization of different virtualization solutions, you need to consider the limit of the number of virtual servers that can be run on a single physical server. Although all virtualization technologies have no limits on the number of virtual servers, in the past the number of virtual servers could not be supported because of excessive excess wastage.

Operating system virtualization technology does not limit the number of virtual servers on a single physical server, and an efficient architecture enables individual servers to support more virtual servers when hardware conditions permit, which can greatly improve the actual usage of the server while maximizing server performance and ROI.

8. Deployment efficiency

In 2005, Ideas International researchers were surprised to find that the biggest benefit of server virtualization was that it saved a lot of time on server activation. The server-opening capabilities of each virtualization solution are different. Some solutions offer templates and preset tools, or custom configurations that shorten the opening time. The opening time of different processing methods is very different from 30 seconds to 1 hours. Compared with the stand-alone server, the virtual server dramatically shortens the server's opening time.

9. Expected Virtualization Deployment

The top 3 server virtualization Deployment Scenarios are: test and development, server consolidation, and disaster recovery.

For testing and development projects, because developers need to use many different operating system environment, which makes the related cost is difficult to estimate, the better choice is hardware virtualization.

Server consolidation (involving existing or new applications) typically occurs in production servers that support online applications and data, and two factors to consider are processing loss and server utilization. Among these, the best solution is operating system virtualization, because operating system virtualization has lower server depletion and can significantly increase server utilization.

The disaster recovery solution is a very common virtualized server deployment scenario. Many organizations find disaster recovery scenarios that allow real-time access and provide redundant systems to be extremely expensive. Because virtualized servers can be activated, restarted, and can create critical servers within a limited time, virtualized servers quickly become one of the more cost-effective and highly managed disaster recovery solutions in a short period of time.

10. Total cost of ownership

The final factor to consider is the total cost of ownership for each virtualization technology. Solutions with more features and management tools are naturally more expensive. Some vendors require payment for additional functionality and management tools, which makes it more difficult to compare the total cost of ownership of various virtualization technologies. Taking into account the performance and functionality provided by the basic products, and then comparing the total cost of ownership, users are amazed at the significant difference in the value offered by the various solutions.