LSU Health Sciences Center Works With Dell, Intel and VMware to Complete First Phase of Server Virtualization Program
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Dell Inc. (NASDAQ:DELL):  The LSU Health Sciences Center in New Orleans (LSUHSC-NO) has completed  the first step of a virtual server environment that will help ensure  access to critical patient, research and business data, even in the  event of natural disasters.
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(InfoWorld) - Like other adopters of server virtualization, Purdue University was concerned that its datacenter would hit the wall, exceeding physical space, power, and cooling limits. The use of EMC VMware let it combine 140 physical servers into three Hewlett-Packard DL-585 servers, a 40:1 compression ratio, says Mike Rubesch, director of IT infrastructure systems. "It helps postpone the inevitable," he adds. But the first servers chosen had very low utilization -- around 5 percent -- so the 40:1 rate is not sustainable. Over time, Rubesch expects the ratio to be 6:1, taking into account such servers as e-mail, database, and telephony that cannot be virtualized. That utilization rate will still reduce overall power usage to 16 percent of what it had been and physical space needs to a tenth, as the use of blade servers plus virtualization greatly reduces the physical footprint. Facilities costs should fall by $75,000 per year and hardware costs by $250,000 per year, he says. But organizations considering the use of virtualization need to be careful calculating costs, Rubesch cautions. If you have fewer than 10 virtual server instances running on a physical VMware server, virtualization becomes "extraordinarily expensive," he says. IT managers must also be careful not to factor in too much savings for the operating systems and applications running in virtual machines, Rubesch says. Many IT managers count on being able to run multiple instances of an OS or an app on one CPU, paying for just one license, because most enterprise apps are licensed on a per-CPU basis. But vendors are starting to charge per instance, not per CPU. For example, BEA now charges per instance rather than per CPU for its WebLogic server, and Microsoft Windows Server Enterprise Edition's license allows use on one physical server and as many as four VMs on that server. As virtualization grows more popular, you can expect the licensing savings to evaporate, so the investment should be based on savings elsewhere, such as in hardware and facilities efficiencies, Rubesch says. The use of VMs also increases your risk, because "you can put a lot of eggs in one basket," Rubesch says. But because you've reduced the number of points of failure, IT staff has more capability to focus on those critical areas, he notes. Rubesch is building sufficient capacity so that no single server is fully utilized, providing space for EMC's VMotion software to move VMs if a physical server fails. He's also keeping a spare physical server ready to go if needed. Using virtualization also incurs a high up-front cost. "The benefits aren't immediate," Rubesch says. A big reason is that to use the EMC VMotion utility to move server instances to other physical servers for better load-balancing or failover requires that all the hardware use the same CPU family, requiring a big hardware cost at each refresh cycle. "You need to sell that concept a little bit," he says dryly. Beyond the hardware costs, the use of virtualization makes the server environment more complicated, as "servers" can reside anywhere and change where they reside over time. As a result, "you need more skills," Rubesch says. For example, although a good Windows administrator will easily adapt to running virtualized Windows servers, you still need a dedicated person to handle such items as dynamic allocation and failover, he says. Of course, you can also use virtualization to simplify your environment, Rubesch notes, such as having standard server images that ensure consistency -- ending the nightmare of navigating the peculiarities specific to each hand-deployed physical server. "It's a lot simpler with VMs to have them nearly identical." Despite the caveats on understanding actual savings and the increased up-front costs, Rubesch is a big fan of server virtualization: "You get real benefit from it -- as long as you plan ahead." Virtualization special report Case study: Credit Suisse Case study: Nationwide Insurance Case study: Stonebridge Bank Case study: Transplace
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Companies are taking several paths to overcome user- and vendor-created hurdles to the implementation of virtualization technologies.
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Microsoft Corp  said on Thursday  that it has begun public trials of virtualization software that  will compete head-on with programs from VMware Inc ,  saying the tests were starting ahead of schedule.
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VMware, Inc., the global leader in virtual infrastructure software for industry-standard systems, announced 4-Way VMware Virtual SMP (symmetric multiprocessing).
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AMD, Dell, Intel, Microsoft and Sun Microsystems have joined forces on Web Services Management, a new specification that promises to simplify systems management.
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VMware and Cisco see a data center operating system coming, in which a data center cloud would be populated by servers, storage and Cisco's "intelligent" networking gear, all managed by Cisco and its partners -- starting with VMware.
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HP has moment of Xen as well Citrix Systems has wrangled Dell as the first Tier 1 server vendor to embed the Xen hypervisor in its x86 servers.â¦
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At VMware's user conference, server vendors lined up to pledge support for a "thin hypervisor" version of the company's virtualization software that can be built directly into systems.
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Marking its first foray into server virtualization, Microsoft will release its oft-delayed Virtual Server 2005 on Oct. 1. The software allows multiple operating systems to run side by side on a single machine.
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Capacity planners, performance gurus, and Computer Measurement Group members, your day may dawn once again as server virtualization turns the practice of throwing hardware at problems into a counterproductive task.
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Dell, EMC, Intel and Oracle have sealed an alliance to develop grid computing technology. The move is an effort to develop a standard approach to building and deploying enterprise grid computing infrastructures.
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(InfoWorld) - Dell has announced the availability of virtualisation services that aim to help enterprises draw up and implement their virtualisation plans -- and it'll help you choose from its own hardware and software portfolio too of course. The process starts with Dell's Virtualisation Readiness Assessment (VRA). The VRA provides companies with a way to evaluate the impact a virtual infrastructure will have on its data center, according to the company. Dell reckoned that the service indicates the potential financial savings of a virtual infrastructure and explains how a virtualized environment could improve server management, maximize uptime and streamline deployment, and enable a company to simplify and scale operations to meet present and future demands. Dell's partners in the initiative include VMware, Microsoft, Red Hat, and Novell/SuSE. Dell said it provides a number of other virtualisation services including 'health checks', infrastructure and migration workshops, as well as design and implementation services that include proof of concept testing prior to deployment. The aim, said Dell is to provide a single source for a tested and vendor-validated virtualized solution. The Texas company said its services division aims to provide an end-to end virtualisation solution that simplifies IT and helps its customers design, configure, test, migrate, and maintain their systems, as well as reap the benefits of virtualisation. Dell quoted four reference sites for its services. The first is Deelgemeente Ijsselmonde, a local authority in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The system Dell helped set up helps to deliver key community services to its surrounding population, via a consolidated server environment. The second reference site, said Dell, is Belgian consultancy ARCADIS which has implemented a SAN with a virtualized system that makes disaster recovery simpler and represents a step towards an efficient disaster recovery plan. Third, AZ Vesalius, a hospital in Belgium, is using a virtual server infrastructure to improve scalability to support the hospital's growth, according to Dell. And lastly, when the Marienhaus Klinikum Hospital in Germany needed a dependable IT Infrastructure for its 24/7 medical services, incorporating a back-up strategy for business continuity, it did so with the help of Dell's virtualisation services. "Increasingly, companies are looking for ways to make themselves more agile and competitive as well as create the most efficient IT infrastructure within the organization," said Dell's infrastructure consulting director Francois Argouges. "By managing and scaling resources as needed, organizations can continually refresh their IT infrastructure to support their dynamic business needs. Dell is committed to working with its customers and partners in order to deliver the most enhanced virtualisation solution on the market, backed up by industry leading support and services." The company also announced that it'll be unveiling a Vista migration service in autumn 2007.
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Microsoft Corp. , seeking to  preserve the dominance of its Windows franchise, launched a new  software application that takes aim at VMware Inc. , the  leader in "virtualization" technology that allows a single  computer server to operate like many machines.
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By Brad Hem, Houston Chronicle  Feb. 18--An engineering team at HP had figured out how to squeeze a faster and more powerful computer server into one-third the traditional space. That was supposed to be the hard part.
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Hoping to prove that grid computing can work in the business world, Dell, EMC, Intel and Oracle have announced a joint effort designed to show business users how to use the distributed computing technology.
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SilverBack's service-delivery platform will be incorporated into the hardware vendor's operations to bolster Dell's IT services.