Server Virtualisation..The options? Your opinions & feedback...

[cpjitservices]

We have 2 IBM servers running Xen & KVM both with about 10 machines on each, we have only just moved to Xen / KVM and can see a difference between that and VMWare which we were using the performance differences are amazing!! We have both Servers on 1GB trunks to the switch which is a Juniper EX2200 - the only thing is that we are adding new machines to Xen so we have to upgrade our RAM abit in both servers.

 

I wouldn't go back to VMWare now if someone paid me a million pounds, KVM and Xen have a nice interface which is very simple to use! we are looking at getting a back up server to host all the VM's on one box and we are going to load ProxMox (Proxmox - Proxmox VE) which is a web front end for KVM & Xen, the migration was simple and can easily migrate VM's from one node to the other.

[glennda]

@cpjitservices not seen proxmox before - looks quite cool might give it a go

[MYK-IT]

We have just put in a new san, 3 hosts and 2 switches.

 

The San is a NetApp FAS 2040 with 15k SAS drives for server storage and SATA drives in a seperate disk shelf for 'slow' storage.

 

The hosts are all HP DL360 G7 with 48gb RAM each, opteron processor, quad nic's, redundant PSU etc.

 

The switches are HP Procurve.

 

We then have a 4th host in another building which is a HP G6 and has an MSA60 and auto loading tape drive attached to it so we can put backups to tape using Backup Exec 2010 and put them into a fire proof safe in a third building.

 

The hosts are running ESX with VMWare on it.

 

Got installed last week and is very sweet!

 

Hi RTFM

 

Was this is installed by yourself, or did you get assistance from the hardware supplier?

What capacity is the MSA60 (for backup) in relation to the capacity available from the new SAN?

With the SAN have you used RAID 5,6, 10 etc? and what % proportion have you allocated for SAN snapshots?

 

Have you got a 'physical' Domain Controller? and have you installed vCentre virtually? (ie initially installed onto one host, then setup a cluster so it still works if a host goes down)

 

Are you backing up on a file level? or VHD image level? snapshots? or a combination?

 

Sorry to ask so many question, but greatly appreciated if you could offer some feedback.

[DavidYoung]

We have VMWare Essentials Plus on 3 HP DL380 servers sitting on top of an Infortrend SAN. The SAN is quite low-end (despite costing 8k fully loaded) but still managed to survive a controller failure and 2 hard disk failures without causing any downtime (except for a few VMs which were on a LUN that was mis-configured, but even they came back when we re-mapped the LUN, and didn't even need rebooting, seems VMWare freezes the VMs if it looses connection to the disk).

 

If you go for VMWare or HyperV, I would have a good look at VEEAM for backup. We put it in over Easter, and its brilliant, used to use Backup Exec, but the cost would have been much higher, and the product isn't as good, we just use it now to ship the VEEAM backups to tape. It de-dupes the backups, so they take a lot less space than the live VMs (although our full backup is still over 1TB!) and takes a complete snapshot of the whole VM so you can restore everything instantly. We restored one VM in under 10 mins using the instant recovery feature which runs the VM live from the backup file, very cool technology.

 

They support VMWare now, and will support HyperV in v6 which should come out soon.

[cpjitservices]

Just loaded Proxmox onto one of the backup servers and it's fantastic - I'd recommend anyone using Xen & KVM to give it a go!!!!!

 

Might I add that Yes It's Open Source!

[gshaw]

Yup we have Veeam as well, felt weird moving after so many years of Backup Exec but the difference in price (Veeam much much lower) and features (Veeam much more) meant it was a no-brainer.

 

@RTFM, your setup sounds ideal for Veeam as your 4th host could run a basic VMWare license then use Veeam Replication to run a standby copy of the VMs for DR purposes. Wish I could do that here but I haven't got anywhere to put another server outside of the server room

[RTFM]

@RTFM, your setup sounds ideal for Veeam as your 4th host could run a basic VMWare license then use Veeam Replication to run a standby copy of the VMs for DR purposes. Wish I could do that here but I haven't got anywhere to put another server outside of the server room

 

NetApp have their own inbuilt software (Snapvault) so we dont actually use Veeam The 4th host and storage in the secondary server room at a pinch could do what we need it to do for critical systems but I think the ideal plan is to have another NetApp in the other building and then replicate them and chuck an extra host in there too.

Edited November 24, 2011 by RTFM

[gshaw]

Ahh fair do's, think I remember it now from when we looked at the FAS series (luckily you haven't got the 2020 which had some awful feedback due to the slow CPU)

 

A 2nd SAN... can I have your budget please

[RTFM]

Ahh fair do's, think I remember it now from when we looked at the FAS series (luckily you haven't got the 2020 which had some awful feedback due to the slow CPU)

 

A 2nd SAN... can I have your budget please

 

We actually did look at the 2020 simply due to the fact we got a quote saying we could have had 2 for the same price as 1 of the 2040's.

 

It was feedback on here and from the company doing the install about the 2020 being a little slow that pushed us towards the 2040. The 2020 also wasnt as expandable as the 2040.

 

We're just spending up whilst we have it, the second SAN is only an idea *shrug*

[gshaw]

We're just spending up whilst we have it, the second SAN is only an idea *shrug*

 

It's a good one to do if you can, especially in a separate building, covers your DR very nicely

[Finch7]

I had read about VMware being able to be installed like that, even on a SD Card installed internally.

HDD-less physical servers would mean money towards a SAN.

 

What version of VMWare are you using? and backup methods?

 

Thanks

 

Yep we're running VMware on a SD card but we have no SAN.

 

We got the VMware essentials bundle which includes three host licences and the Vcentre licence. (Vcenter is worth every penny)

 

We use Veeam to replicate and back up our VMs

 

I still use DPM to back up our data, file recovery is much simpler and quicker with DPM.

 

Currently have 2 hosts,

R710, with 48G Ram and 8x 600Gb (15K SAS) drives and a T710 exact spec but with 10 drives

 

Both servers are physically separated across the site

 

Veeam replicates our live VMs on the R710 to the T710.

Veeam backs up our VMs to the DPM server in a third physical location

 

The T710 rather than sit idle with replicated DMs onboard actually runs 5 RDS servers in a farm. We use this for our older laptops to be useful, they make a remote desktop to them.

We also use Sonicwall to give RDP connections at home to the Farm.

 

So no SAN sure you lose the ability to move VMs in a fraction of a second. But I didn't really see a need for that and the SAN then becomes a single point of Failure in the event it does.

 

Happy to provide more info if you need it. I'm loving our setup and virtualisation in general. Create a server in seconds (from a template I've created) fantastic.

 

Currently virtualised

1 AD server

File servers

Web server

WDS server

5 RDS servers

Print server

SIMS server

Library server

Moodle server

finance server

Vcentre server (but might not have been the best option to do so)

SCCM server

 

I may use our third licence to vitualise our IPCCTV server.

What am I running physically now apart from the IPCCTV

well 2 AD server (all AD servers do DNS/DHCP too)

and the old RIS server that hosts a few apps (one needing a usb dongle)

Edited November 24, 2011 by Finch7

[garethEds]

Stay tuned to my blog on here, and links over on Microsoft Schools blog as I will be detailing our solution using HyperV and two R710s, 1 MD3200 SAN. Didnt cost the earth either - I had a very limited budget too!

 

A couple of quick answers tho... yes, cluster your Hyper V. Why? Well, you can then do the rebooting of Physical servers with no downtime. You can let HyperV migrate them around for you. We had this demonstrated perfectly when we had a UPS power board fail taking out a server. Yes, the VM OSs will need updating, but let WSUS take care of that, and reboot for the ones that need it out of hours by scheduled tasks.

 

A quick whistly stop, but any qs message me. There will be articles soon on this. If you are in the southwest - or can get here, you are welcome to come and take a look.

 

I like the look of this Dell stuff but maybe will need some help configuring what I will need. I will want 2 R710 servers and 1 SAN - but am not sure what. I may have to start with 1 R710 and move from there. We don't really need the heartbeat stuff but will need to backup our virtual machines.

 

Any help in the near future will be appreciated. I'm starting to put our bid together now.

 

What server spec have you got for your R710s and SAN? Did you get them direct from Dell?

 

Gareth

[MYK-IT]

Progressing a bit more on this project, some more queries that I hope others can assist with.

 

Backup

'If' we had 2 (or 3 nodes for redundancy) using VMware vSphere 5 Essentials Plus would Microsoft's DPM 2010 running on a separate NAS (DELL NX3100 for example) work/be adequate for backups? Combined with the 'snapshotting' feature of a SAN?

 

Only looking at DPM2010 as the cost is hardly anything, especially in comparison to if we upgraded to Backup Exec 2010 for example (with all the agents etc.).

 

I know many have mentioned Veeam, and version 6 is out now but can someone explain its costs, how it is licenced etc.? Thanks

 

Licencing

Can someone clarify that I have understood the licencing correctly?

 

Windows 2008 R2 Enterprise will allow 4 (virtual instances) of Server to be installed per licence.

 

Windows 2008 R2 Datacentre will allow an unlimited (virtual instances) of Server to be installed but is licenced per physical CPU per physical server (node).

So if we have 2 nodes (each with 2 physical CPUs) that would require 4 licences?

If we had 3 nodes (which ideally are required for redundancy for virtualisation) could we still only use 4 licences? As the 3rd node would only be used if node 1 or 2 failed?

 

What is the correct/recommended method of procuring the Server 2008 R2 licences now? As EES I believe Microsoft EES is for desktop but would cover the Server CALs?

 

Hyper-V

To be honest I've not seen the full potential of Hyper-V as an (cheaper) alternative to VMware.

Does anyone know if the article was published on the Microsoft's School Blog in relation to using 2x R710 with Hyper-V? as that sounds very similar to a setup configuration we are looking at.

 

Many thanks,

[Domino]

Progressing a bit more on this project, some more queries that I hope others can assist with.

 

Licencing

Can someone clarify that I have understood the licencing correctly?

 

Windows 2008 R2 Enterprise will allow 4 (virtual instances) of Server to be installed per licence.

 

Windows 2008 R2 Datacentre will allow an unlimited (virtual instances) of Server to be installed but is licenced per physical CPU per physical server (node).

So if we have 2 nodes (each with 2 physical CPUs) that would require 4 licences?

If we had 3 nodes (which ideally are required for redundancy for virtualisation) could we still only use 4 licences? As the 3rd node would only be used if node 1 or 2 failed?

 

Nope, you licence Physical Processors. That means any processors the vm's licenced by datacenter can run on need to be licenced for datacentre edition.

 

Hyper-V

To be honest I've not seen the full potential of Hyper-V as an (cheaper) alternative to VMware.

 

We're looking to move our internal infrastructure from vmware to hyper-v, as the vmware licencing for 60 CPUs is getting ridiculous, and with datacentre processor licencing in place we're only needing to licence SCVMM to get very close to the same functionality. VMware vSphere 4 vs. Microsoft Hyper-V R2 - Whitepaper | CTI Strategy Blog

 

I'm hoping to get out first UK based Hyper-v cluster up in the next few weeks, so may well write up the experience, coming from a vmware background.

[gshaw]

You could use DPM but it won't give you full VM-level recovery unless you use Hyper-V. Personally once I go virtual I'd want to be able to recover all my virtual machines for DR so whether you go VMWare \ Veeam or Hyper-V \ DPM (or also Hyper-V \ Veeam) it's a better strategy than just having file-level backups imo.

 

Snapshots on the SAN will need to be application-consistent for VM snaps to be of any use, depends on your SAN and features licensing...

 

Windows Datacenter licensing is awesome, definitely one of Microsoft's best offers

 

@Domino... 60 CPUs wow, how big is your site for that little lot... 30 dual CPU VM host servers?

Edited December 6, 2011 by gshaw

[Domino]

That's over our global sites - we've a fair few clusters in that ;-) The vmware EA isn't as good value as it used to be either :-(

 

It's also likely to double next year, so unless there's something really wrong with hyper-v it's the way to go for us.

[MYK-IT]

Just another query regarding MS DPM and Hyper-V.

 

If we had 3 nodes (2 used +1 for redundancy)

 

Would I be correct in stating that we could just purchase 3x MS DPM Enterprise Licences?

This would allow us to backup all virtualised servers but not at file level?

 

But if we wanted to backup each virtualised server at file level (say 12, 6 per node) we would have to purchase 12x MS DPM Standard Licences (Enterprise Licences for any Exchange/SQL servers) and this would allow us to install the DPM agent on each virtualised server?

 

Thanks,

[MYK-IT]

Stay tuned to my blog on here, and links over on Microsoft Schools blog as I will be detailing our solution using HyperV and two R710s, 1 MD3200 SAN. Didnt cost the earth either - I had a very limited budget too!

 

A couple of quick answers tho... yes, cluster your Hyper V. Why? Well, you can then do the rebooting of Physical servers with no downtime. You can let HyperV migrate them around for you. We had this demonstrated perfectly when we had a UPS power board fail taking out a server. Yes, the VM OSs will need updating, but let WSUS take care of that, and reboot for the ones that need it out of hours by scheduled tasks.

 

A quick whistly stop, but any qs message me. There will be articles soon on this. If you are in the southwest - or can get here, you are welcome to come and take a look.

 

TheScarfedOne,

 

Is this the blog you were talking about?

 

Microsoft UK Education - Further Education blog - Further Education blog

 

When are the next installments planned for release?

 

Thanks,

[fiza]

Stay tuned to my blog on here, and links over on Microsoft Schools blog as I will be detailing our solution using HyperV and two R710s, 1 MD3200 SAN. Didnt cost the earth either - I had a very limited budget too!

 

A couple of quick answers tho... yes, cluster your Hyper V. Why? Well, you can then do the rebooting of Physical servers with no downtime. You can let HyperV migrate them around for you. We had this demonstrated perfectly when we had a UPS power board fail taking out a server. Yes, the VM OSs will need updating, but let WSUS take care of that, and reboot for the ones that need it out of hours by scheduled tasks.

 

A quick whistly stop, but any qs message me. There will be articles soon on this. If you are in the southwest - or can get here, you are welcome to come and take a look.

 

Where can I view the blog you speak of?

[detjo]

Has anyone looked at the free Microsoft Hyper-V Server (not Windows server 2008 with Hyper-V installed) as an alternative to ESXi ?