CamelMan Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 We have SIMS running on our virtual server setup - Local LEA was against it (performance, might not work etc), Capita didnt see a problem. Capita won out.
Mr.Ben Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Done at my previous school and this one. No downsides as far as I can see, only the upsides of being able to throw more power at it (or balance resources in it's favour over other vm's). The LEA's 'It might not work' shows there lack of virtualisation knowledge :-)
psydii Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Ran it on MS Virtual Server in 2007. Worked fine. Co-hosted with a wsus server, a sophos server and a few other little things.
localzuk Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Yup, virtualised here. Not quite as fast as I want it to be (but that might be me being over-ambitious, and me not having my setup ideal), but 'ideal' means 'near instant for everything'...
Gongalong Posted May 8, 2013 Author Posted May 8, 2013 We're running on Hyper-V, but less than brilliant. Seems to be a very busy server, and even with quad core it just doesn't seem to have enough oomph.
Cache Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 We virtualised it in the summer and it's been no problem at all.
FN-GM Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Yep did it years ago on VMware no issues at all. Making is virtual makes things so flexible.
Jamman960 Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Will be going virtual this summer while I get rid of w2k3....its currently one of 2 remaining non virtualised servers
Sylv3r Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Will be moving to a virtual 2012 server in the summer when it supports everything we use - SIMS, Discover, SLG.
3s-gtech Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Virtual here, but it's the only VM on the host. Did it this way so we could upgrade the server by doing a P2V. It's flexible and can move to another host easily now. Fast too on ESXi.
dhicks Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Have you virtualised SIMS? Yes - both server and client-side. Client-side remote desktop means you can have teacher's SIMS accounts linked to their active directory account, so when they log in to a terminal services sessiosn / virtual desktop you have SIMS start up and log straight in. You can then set a screensaver timeout of, say, 3 minutes, so if they wander off and leave their SIMS sessions open they'll have to re-login to be able to use it, which is rather more secure than the default. 1
TheScarfedOne Posted May 8, 2013 Posted May 8, 2013 Same here, hyper v...and a running the clients as remote apps from my RDS farm 1
SBennett Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 Wow, I'm one of the odd ones out. Our SIMS / Discover / FMS is all on one physical server.. I prefer it though.
localzuk Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 Wow, I'm one of the odd ones out. Our SIMS / Discover / FMS is all on one physical server.. I prefer it though. Why do you prefer it?
SBennett Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 Why do you prefer it? We have a Hyper-V host here and we only run stuff on there that is not as important as something like SIMS. I know that if the SIMS server was to go down, I could easily get it backup up and running on our Hyper-V host but it would be harder the other way around.
CAM Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 I don't know if my current place virtualises it as I am split away from backend management of the network. My last place wasn't virtualised though and was actually all-in-one along with duty as a file server and at one point, AD controller and print server.
localzuk Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 We have a Hyper-V host here and we only run stuff on there that is not as important as something like SIMS. I know that if the SIMS server was to go down, I could easily get it backup up and running on our Hyper-V host but it would be harder the other way around. It would be simpler via a VM - just slap hyper-v on a %random machine, and load up the VM. Done. Restoring a VM is a couple of minutes work. Rather than having to craft an entire environment again, to restore your SIMS backup... Not to mention, if you design your VM infrastructure correctly (with at least 2 nodes, and redundant shared storage), if the VM host goes down with SIMS on it, the other takes over and loads it back up again. If you lose one of your storage servers, the other one is still working...
SBennett Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 It would be simpler via a VM - just slap hyper-v on a %random machine, and load up the VM. Done. Restoring a VM is a couple of minutes work. Rather than having to craft an entire environment again, to restore your SIMS backup... Not to mention, if you design your VM infrastructure correctly (with at least 2 nodes, and redundant shared storage), if the VM host goes down with SIMS on it, the other takes over and loads it back up again. If you lose one of your storage servers, the other one is still working... Well I only have one Hyper-V server. But I guess it changes with every school. Some schools prefer virtualization, others do not.
kennysarmy Posted May 9, 2013 Posted May 9, 2013 Vmware here, recently upgraded from server 2003 to 2008
vikpaw Posted May 11, 2013 Posted May 11, 2013 I don't know if my current place virtualises it as I am split away from backend management of the network. My last place wasn't virtualised though and was actually all-in-one along with duty as a file server and at one point, AD controller and print server. Ask them if you can have a bit more RAM due to a poor spring update, if they run to the hills crying, you'll know it's physical. If they ask how much, ask for another 4GB
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