Server Consolidation

From Capacity Planning projects carried out by Castle, we have discovered that typically over 90% of Servers are running at 7% of their capacity or less. This fact underpins how the cost savings shown in our Power Savings Calculator can be achieved. Because nearly all servers run just a single application, only a small portion of the physical server’s resources are actually used.

Simply, VMware takes the operating system and the application residing on the Physical Server and turns them into a flat file, which it calls a “Virtual Machine”. This means that a physical server can now become home to many Virtual machines and operating systems. And this, in essence is how server consolidation is achieved. Because, using VMware, Server utilisation is much higher, up to 90% of physical servers are no longer required. Just consider what this means. Think of the resources required by each of the servers that you no longer need?

• Power to run them
• Power to cool them
• Office space
• Cost of maintenance contracts
• Cost of depreciation

Our Cairn Housing Association case study provides a great example of what can be achieved. You can also try our Power Savings Calculator to see how much you could really save.

More than Consolidation

Because your traditional servers have been distilled into “flat” Virtual Machine files, managing them is much easier. VMware manages the resources required automatically. Using what VMware calls Vmotion, VMware is able to move Virtual Machine files between physical servers to ensure optimum performance.

Vmotion also allows Virtual server files to be copied to allow server maintenance, application upgrades and testing to take place on the new file. Once you are satisfied that it is working, you simply replace the original, without disruption to the users. This virtually eliminates expensive out of hours maintenance.

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)

Once you have Virtualisation, you can also take advantage of Virtual Desktop infrastructure. VDI is what’s known as a “Thin Client” solution. Thin client terminals consume only 10% of the power consumed by a PC and last much longer as they don’t need to be upgraded. However, unlike other thin client solutions, VDI has the flexibility to provide applications and resources as required by each user. This means that the users have the flexibility associated with a PC, but the organisation has the ease of management, control of data and cost advantages of a thin client solution.

To find out more see our Green IT and VDI literature.

Capacity Planning

A Capacity Planning exercise will determine how many physical servers you require and how many of your existing servers can be re-utilised. See the information contained on this website regarding Capacity Planning or contact us to discuss your requirements.