MFCF's Virtualization Experience using VMWare Tom Serviss, Technical Manager, MFCF Greg Walker, Principal Consultant, Gibraltar Solutions Inc

MFCF's Virtualization Experience using VMWare

Tom Serviss, Technical Manager, MFCFGreg Walker, Principal Consultant, Gibraltar Solutions Inc.

Agenda

Introduction to VMware Introduction to LeftHand Networks Proof of Concept at MFCF Live Demonstration

WatITis | Life After 50 | December 4, 2007 | MFCF's Server Virtualization Experience using VMWare

INTRODUCTION TO VMWARE

Greg Walker, Principal Consultant, Gibraltar Solutions Inc.


4

Physical Server

Server Virtualization

Benefits• Increase hardware utilization by

sharing hardware resources across a large number of virtual machines.

Virtual Machines

ESX Server

Deploy multiple virtual machines on a single physical server

5

Anatomy of a Virtual Machine

Each Virtual Machine is a complete system encapsulated in a set of software files

(X86) Physical Server

ESX Server

Virtual MachinesUnmodified Application

Unmodified OS

Virtual Hardware

6

Virtualization of Servers, Storage and Networking

Server

Virtual Machines

ESX Server

Server Farm

ESX Server

ESX Server

ESX Server

ESX Server

ESX Server

ESX Server

Virtual Machines

Enterprise Virtualization

VMware Infrastructure

ESX Server

Network

Storage

• Partition CPU and memory in multiple virtual machines

• Store virtual machine disks on local or shared storage. VMFS cluster file system manages virtual machine disk storage

• Build networks within or across ESX Servers.

7

Heterogeneous Operating System Support

Windows Server 2003 Standard, Enterprise, Web Editions, and Small Business Server

Windows 2000 Server and Advanced Server

Windows NT : 4.0 Server

Windows XP Professional

Red Hat Linux 7.2, 7.3, 8.0, & 9.0

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 2.1 & 3

Solaris 10 (on x86)

SUSE Linux 8.2, 9.0 and 9.1

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 8

Novell NetWare 5.1, 6.0 and 6.5

FreeBSD 4.9

• Rigorously tested to run 28 versions of all major operating systems

• 64-bit operating system support (including Vista, Longhorn beta, and Linux)

Freedom to choose the most appropriate OS for any application

8

Enterprise Workloads

• 16 GB RAM

• Up to 4 virtual CPUs

• Support for powerful physical servers with up to 32 logical CPU and 64 GB RAM

Run the most resource intensive enterprise applications such as databases, CRM and ERP applications in virtual machines

9

VirtualCenter - Key Functionality

7

Programmatic Interfaces

Virtual Machine and Server

Management

1

Provisioning

2

Migration

3

Resource Management

4

System Monitoring

5

Security and Access Control

6

Centralized Management

10

Live Migration Of Virtual Machines with VMotion

•What is it?• Live migration of virtual machines with VMware VMotion

•Customer Impact• Zero downtime

• Continuous service availability

• Complete transaction integrity

• Supported on Fibre Channel and iSCSI SAN and NAS

11

Resource Optimization with VMware DRS

• What is it?

• Dynamic balancing of computing resources across resource pools

• Intelligent resource allocation based on pre-defined rules

• Customer Impact

• Align IT resources with business priorities

• Operational simplicity; dramatically increase system administrator productivity

• Add hardware dynamically to avoid over-provisioning to peak load

• Automate hardware maintenance

Dynamic and intelligent allocation of hardware resources to ensure optimal alignment between business and IT

Resource Pool

Business Demand

12

Capacity on Demand with VMware DRS

•Provisioning is “fire and forget”

•Easily add more capacity

•Avoid over-provisioning to peak load

Add hardware dynamically

Resource PoolCPU 36GHz, Mem 58GB

Priority HIGH

Resource PoolCPU 50 GHz, Mem 70GB

Priority HIGH

13

Ensure High availability with VMware HA

• What is it?• Automatic restart of virtual

machines in case of server failure

• Customer Impact• Cost effective high availability for

all applications

• No need for dedicated stand-by hardware

• None of the cost and complexity of clustering

VMware HA enables cost-effective high availability for all applications

Resource Pool

X

14

Resource Pools

Aggregate collections of disparate hardware resources into unified logical resource pools

• Customer Impact• Failed server mean less

resources not a failed application

• Dedicated (virtual) infrastructure for each business unit; central IT retains control over hardware

• Delegation of resource and virtual machine management down to the business unit

• Management of an entire SOA application stack as a single entity

Servers, Storage, Networking

Business Unit

Department A Department B

Aggregate Resources

Resource Pool 2CPU 36GHz, Mem 58GB

Priority HIGH

Resource Pool 3CPU 12GHz, Mem 22GB

Priority LOW

CPU 48 GHz, Mem 80GB

15

Protect data with VMware Consolidated Backup

• What is it?• Centralized agentless backup for

virtual machines

•Move backup out of the virtual machine

•Eliminate backup traffic on the local area network

• Pre-integrated with major 3rd-party backup products

• Customer Impact• Perform backup in the middle of the

day

Centralized file level backup enables easy & reliable data protection

CentralizedData Mover

16

VMware Infrastructure – Key Solutions / Use Cases

Server Consolidation and Containment – Eliminate server sprawl by deploying systems into virtual machines

Test and Development – Rapidly provision and re-provision test and development servers; store libraries of pre-configured test machines

Enterprise Desktop – Secure unmanaged PCs. Alternatively, provide standardized enterprise desktop environments hosted on servers.

Business Continuity – Reduce the cost and complexity of business continuity by encapsulating entire systems files that can be replicated and restored onto any target server

Infrastructure Provisioning – Reduce the time for provisioning new infrastructure to minutes with sophisticated automation capabilities.

Legacy Application Re-hosting – Migrate legacy operating systems and software applications to virtual machines running on new hardware for better reliability

17

Benefits:

Reduce hardware costs up to 30-50%

Reduce operations costs up to 70-80%

Reduce complexity

Deploy new services efficiently

Solving the Problem

•VMware Infrastructure provides a managed approach to regain control over serve sprawl

•VMware customers have consolidated ~1 mln servers to date

18

VMware Infrastructure – Cost Savings

Increase utilization From

• 5%-15%

To

• 60-80%

Consolidate hardware •10-15 : 1 in production

•15-20 : 1 in development & testing

Reduce operating costs of rack space, power etc

~$3,000 per year electricity savings for 2CPU ESX Server

Decrease labor cost by simplifying and automating labor intensive IT operations

From

•10 servers per sys admin

To

•30 servers per sys admin

Measurable savings in both capital and operating costs

19

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

• Users:• Student Labs• Outsourced call centers• Offshore developers• Branch office consolidation• Desktop disaster recovery

• Value: Central management, increased security, strong user isolation

• Products: Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure enables enterprises to host desktop virtual

machines in their data center on VMware software and provide users access

from a PC or thin client using a remote display protocol.

INTRODUCTION TO LEFTHAND NETWORKS



Scale Everything Architecture

Scale-up StorageScale-up Storage Scale-out StorageScale-out Storage

LeftHand Clustered ArchitectureLeftHand Clustered ArchitectureTraditional SAN ArchitectureTraditional SAN Architecture

Keep Data Highly Available With Network RAID

AB

C

A

B

C

A

B

C

A

B

C

A

BC

Synchronous Data Replication•Real-Time Protection Levels

•2-Way Replicated Volume•3-Way Replicated Volume

•Assigned on a per-volume basis •Change replication levels on-the-fly

Survive Entire Storage Module Failure•No interruption of application data access•Data access speeds remain constant•No parity calculation required

D

D

D

D

D

D C D BC

C B C B A

Campus SAN: Real-time Protection from Site Failure

B A B A D

A D A CD

Geographically distribute nodes to survive:

• Facility disruption

• Natural disaster

• Technology failure

Physical Separate Cluster By:

• Rack

• Room

• Floor

• Building

Prerequisite:

• Gigabit Connectivity

• Low Latency

Location 1

Location 2

LeftHand NetworksSAN/iQ Cluster

SAN/iQ Campus SAN and VMware® ESX Cluster

VMware ESX HA Cluster

SAN/iQ Cluster is configured with equal storage in each siteESX cluster is configured with equal hosts in each siteSAN/iQ Network RAID replicates data between sites synchronouslyIn the event of a site failure SAN/iQ keeps volumes availableESX High Availability boots up virtual machines lost at the failed siteWhen the failed site comes back online ESX rebalances virtual machines (DRS)

B

A C

D

E

F A C E

B D F

Location 1 Location 2

PROOF OF CONCEPT AT MFCF

Tom Serviss, Technical Manager, MFCF @ UW


Proof of Concept Components

Purchased two new servers and an iSCSI array Servers: HP DL380 G5

Dual quad-core Xeon 16 GB RAM 2 dual-port NICs 1 dual-port iSCSI HBA

Storage: HP DL320s with LeftHand Networks SAN/iQ 12 x 146 GB drives 1.8 TB raw storage, 1.5 TB usable (RAID 5) Two additional demo units provided during training for replication purposes

VMware Software: Virtual Infrastructure 3 2 x VI3 Enterprise 1 x VirtualCenter Management Server


Training

Gibraltar Solutions provided 4 days training for MFCF

Training in ESX Server- the robust foundation of the VMware Infrastructure Training in VirtualCenter- to provision and monitor virtual machines Training in P2V Assistant- to assist in converting from physical to virtual

Training designed to demonstrate Sound foundation in VM concepts Understanding of the implementation procedures Introduction to management tools

5 people completed the training


Early Successes

Citrix Presentation Server 4.5 runs independently of the VM Installation Active Directory and IIS Servers cannot be run directly the

Presentation Server

Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS)


Future Testing

Maple TA – virtual backup and failover Request Tracker (RT) Version 3.6.4 Solaris 10 x86 Red Hat Enterprise 5 VMware Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Microsoft Project Server 2007 Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007


Lessons Learned

Stability Virtual Center reporting loss of heartbeat The VMware heartbeat signal does not depend on the time

sync of the system itself

Performance Thus far acceptable but limited Time required to maximize performance Performance monitoring will be implemented later

Lessons Learned

Provisioning Current VM Servers all provisioned within minutes, not

hours Applying new security updates

Flexibility cannot be fully tested, within the limitations of the current environment Only one SAN available

The high I/O requirements of database applications make virtualization a poor choice

Conclusions

The Green Initiative industry trend towards becoming energy efficient

Consolidation survey pending in the new year Consolidation ratio of 10:1 can be achieved Benefits cooling, power and also reduces the

overall server room footprint

LIVE DEMONSTRATION



Documents

MFCF's Virtualization Experience using VMWare Tom Serviss, Technical Manager, MFCF Greg Walker, Principal Consultant, Gibraltar Solutions Inc