Traditionally businesses utilising IT applications or business systems have been used to using the “one server per business system or application” model. There are several key problems with this model:
1) High set-up or replacement costs
Significant investment is required in order to facilitate the usual enterprise class IT services the business requires (e.g. email, File and Print, Security, Active Directory, Document Management, MRP/ERP etc)
2) Low utilisation of resources
The application hosted normally used only a small portion of the processor, RAM and disk subsystems of the server.
3) Greater running costs
Since each of those servers used power, required cooling and needed physical space to host it in this required a high cost to maintain. In addition the costs of hiring and training the IT admin staff necessary to support each of those servers is significant.
4) Lack of flexibility
If a new server was required the process of commissioning a server was lengthy and involved the procurement (and design phase to ensure it met the demands of the software to be deployed on it), set-up and configuration of the physical hardware.
Virtualisation can solve all this.
Why Virtualise?
Simply speaking it solves all of the problems listed above! Virtualisation allows a business to:
1) Get more out of your existing resources
Run multiple operating systems on a single server, including Windows, Linux and more, and break the “one server per application” model.
Running more than one OS allows a higher percentage utilisation of your processors, RAM and disk subsystems
2) Reduce costs and go greener
Fewer servers and related IT hardware means reduced power, cooling, and space requirements. Reducing your power and cooling requirements decreases your carbon footprint too. If your servers are under a hardware maintenance contract those costs can be reduced also.
3) Gain flexibility
Provisioning a new virtual server is a very simple task.
Dynamically allocate resources (CPU, RAM, Disk etc) as the load dictates.
4) Increase availability
With the addition of shared storage solutions you can backup and migrate between server hosts with no interruption in service. This gets rid of the need to plan downtime for maintenance tasks like performing updates/upgrades to physical hardware.
For a case study on Virtualisation click here. If you would like to discuss how virtualisation can benefit your business, contact us today.