Virtual Server Platforms Update

The Royal Exchange23rd September 2011

Virtual Server Platforms Update• Introduction• vSphere 5:- The Technology• vSphere 5:- The Licence Model• vSphere 5:- What does it mean to me?• Do I have a choice?• Frontier Technology• Wrap up and Q&A

Frontier Technology

• Specialists in Access, Infrastructure, Business Continuity and Data Management

• On-Premise and Cloud Solutions• Key partners

VMware Microsoft Citrix

• We use these platforms in our own datacentres

Your Challenges• Quick introduction• Objective for today• Any infrastructure related challenges?

vSphere 5, the technologyWhat’s new?

• V5 moves to ESXi model ESX vs ESXi confusion

• Storage DRS• vMotion, now supported over high latency links• vCenter Server Virtual Appliance• Web Client, manage vSphere from any Web browser

vSphere 5, the technologyWhat’s new?• Auto Deploy, deploy and update (patch) more

efficiently for ESXi based systems• VM format (v8), adds support for Windows Aero

graphics and USB 3• New guests: OS X 10.6• Even bigger VMs, 32 vCPUs, 1TB RAM• Profile driven storage• vCloud Director for large private cloud deployments

Storage DRS

Storage DRS

Title

Web Client

vSphere 5, the licence model• Becomes vRAM centric rather than CPU cores and

physical memory bound• Some concern in the market about complexity and

value• VMware have done this to align themselves to a

service provider model and to introduce a ‘fairer’ licence model more in proportion to resources used

How many vSphere licences do I need?

• As in vSphere 4 each CPU requires a licence

• vSphere 5 does not impose limits on number of cores per CPU or physical RAM per server

ExampleHosts 2CPUs 4vSphere Licences 4

How much vRAM do I get with my vSphere licenses?Edition vRAM £ costStandard (1 CPU) – vMotion, HA 32GB 793Enterprise (1 CPU) – FT/DRS 64GB 2,295Enterprise Plus (1 CPU) - All 96GB 2,785

Bundles vRAM £ costStandard AK (8 CPU) 8x32GB 7,965Enterprise AK(6 CPU) 6x64GB 13,950Enterprise Plus AK (6 CPU) 6x96GB 17,550Essentials Plus (3 hosts, 6 CPU) 6x32GB 395Essentials (3 hosts, 6 CPU) 6x32GB 3,585

What is the vRAM pool?• Each vSphere licence

includes a vRAM entitlement

• These are pooled together over all vSphere licences of the same edition

• Example 4x Enterprise 4 CPUs 4x 64G = 256G

vRAM

How many VMs can I run with my vRAM pool?

• As many as you like, as long as you do not exceed the total vRAM entitlement of the pool

• Example, 32 VMs each configured with 4GB vRAM, but only 24 powered on = 96GB vRAM consumed from 256GB pool

How many VMs can I power on a host?

• Again as many as you like within the entitlement

• Example: 40 VMs deployed, each with 4G vRAM, distributed unevenly over 2 nodes A B Pool

CPU 2 2 4

vSphere Licences 2 2 4

Virtual Machines 4 36 40

Pooled vRAM (GB) 128 128 256

Consumed vRAM (GB) 16 144 160

What if VMs move with vMotion?• Any VM can run on

any host within a vRAM pool, so movement of VMs cannot cause more vRAM to be needed• 16 VMs on each host

• 4 move• Or they can all move

What is my vRAM pool if I have multiple vCenter Servers

• The vRAM pool can extend across multiple linked vCenter Servers. (Linked Mode is supported with vCenter Server Standard Edition)

Can I mix vSphere editions?• Yes you can, but

each edition will have its own separate vRAM pool

Ent Ent+CPU 4 2

vSphere Licences 4 2

Pooled vRAM (GB) 256 192

Consumed vRAM (GB) 128 96

How do I expand my vRAM pool?• Here we have 4x

Enterprise = 4x64GB = 256GB

• We need some extra vRAM

• Option One: Add another Enterprise licence = 320GB

• Option Two: Upgrade all to Enterprise Plus licence = 384GB

How do I licence a new host?• Add further licences

of the same edition, or

• If you have more licences than CPUs assign licence to new CPUs, but you won’t get any extra vRAM entitlement

So what does that mean to me?• We have a few prepared scenarios• We can quickly work through two or three more if

time allows

Scenario OneNew Small Deployment• 3 hosts, with vMotion• Significant %tage rise• vRAM entitlement should be enough in most cases

vSphere4 vSphere5Essentials Plus £2,660 Essentials Plus £3,585

Support £670 Support £895

Total £3,330 Total £4,480

3 hosts, 6 CPU, 768GB pRAM + vCenter for Essentials

3 hosts, 6 CPU, 192GB vRAM + vCenter for Essentials

Scenario TwoNew Mid-Size Deployment• 5 hosts, with vMotion & DRS/DPM• Small %tage rise• vRAM entitlement should be enough in most cases

vSphere4 vSphere5Mid Size AK (6 CPU) £13,545 Enterprise AK (6 CPU) £13,950

Support £3,385 Support £4,430

4x Enterprise (1 CPU) £8,760 4x Enterprise (1 CPU) £9,180

Support £2,188 Support £2,292

Total £27,878 Total £29,852

10 CPU, 1,280GB pRAM, vCenter Standard

10 CPU, 640GB vRAM, vCenter Standard

Scenario ThreeRenewal of SnS and upgrade to vSphere 5• 3 dual CPU hosts, Advanced Edition• Good News: You’re entitled to Enterprise Edition• Bad News: When your SnS expires you have to pay

the Enterprise Renewal fee• When you upgrade to vSphere 5 you will get vRAM

entitlement of 384GBvSphere4 Advanced vSphere5 EnterpriseProduction Support 1yr £425 Production Support 1yr £570

Basic Support 1yr £360 Basic Support 1yr £480

vRAM entitlement 384GB

Scenario FourUpgrade Mid-Size Standard Edition Deployment• 3x dual socket vSphere 4 Standard hosts, 200GB

vRAM used• Upgrade to vSphere 5 Standard is FOC with active

SnS• 6 licences = 6x32GB vRAM entitlement = 192GB

vRAM, insufficient to support the workload.• Additional Standard Edition licence required, or• Upgrade to Enterprise Edition

Scenario FiveAdd Workloads to Mid-Size Deployment• 3x dual socket vSphere 4 Enterprise hosts, 200GB

vRAM used• Virtualise new application, Exchange 2010, 4+ roles,

32-48GB RAM per role = 192GB extra vRAM required (392GB total)

• 6 CPUs with 64GB entitlement = 384GB vRAM• Borderline whether enough vRAM, but likely to need

additional server resources anyway

How much vRAM do I get with my vSphere licenses?Edition Now Origina

lEnterprise Plus 96GB 48GBEnterprise 64GB 32GBStandard 32GB 24GBEssentials Plus 32GB 24GBEssentials 32GB 24GB

Do I have a choice?x86 Server Virtualisation Magic Quadrant• VMware• Citrix• Microsoft• Others

VMware vSphereAdvantages DisadvantagesAcknowledged Market Leader – VMware still wins 60% of new business

Premium Cost

Functionality v5 Licence ConfusionBroad Guest SupportRange of editions at price points including entry level

Risk Free? – High levels of Customer Satisfaction

Microsoft Hyper-VAdvantages DisadvantagesHas moved from being a challenger to a leader this year

Fewer production deployments than vSphere

Now widely deployed, especially in mid-market, No 2

Limited non-mainstream guest support

Cost and licence management benefits Strong Microsoft Centric management with SCVMM

Continues to close gap on capabilities, live migration in 2009, dynamic memory in 2010Reliant on base Windows OS: Proven driver architecture

Citrix XenServerAdvantages DisadvantagesMoved from Challenger to Leader this year. Third Place in Market share

Product maturity can be an issue, planning and testing important for enterprise deployment

Leading Desktop/Application virtualisation vendor

Fewer production deployments than Hyper-V

Leveraging that to drive server adoption

Skills rare in market

XenServer can reduce costsVision to become “Open” platform for cloud computing

Citrix XenServer Costs

Edition Features CostFree Hypervisor, management, Live Migration FOC

Advanced Distributed Virtual Switch, HA, Memory Optimisation

£600

Enterprise Dynamic Workload Balancing, Power Management,

£1,750

Platinum Auto VM protect & recover, LAB Manager, Site Recovery

£3,000

Others• Red Hat

Background in Xen, but Citrix acquisition shifted to KVM focus

Many more RHEL deployments in VMware than Red Hat• Oracle

Different x86 & SPARC platforms x86 is Xen based Late to market Oracle certification! An option for Oracle database and application

environments• Parallels

Good for high density deployment of specific applications,

More likely to be seen used by service providers Can reduce overhead and OS costs

Others• With each of these Niche Players you are likely to

need a strong specific driver to veer from the mainstream leaders

The who cares option• Cloud based hosting service

Forget about • CapEx• Flexible Licensing• Resource planning• Storage • Fire Fighting

• Let Frontier manage those resources You focus on:

• Line of Business Applications• Delivering Business Value• Providing High Quality User Support and Services• Strategic Thinking• Improving Businesses Bottom Line• Investment & Resource into New Initiatives and Projects

The who cares option• Frontier Infrastructure

Two datacentres Scalable CPU, RAM, I/O resources Fibre Channel attached multi-tier storage platform Enterprise class data management platform

• Backup, archive, index, search, discover, report

• Frontier Services Range from:

• Fully managed service such as business continuity To:

• Provision of OS and Storage only, you continue to manage

Our Other Offerings• Infrastructure Optimisation Service

Server hardware, Hypervisor, OS Free resources to reduce hardware spend

• Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Solutions• Data Management Platforms (backup, archive, replicate,

report, index, search, discover)• Remote Working and Access Solutions• Server and Storage Infrastructure• All available in either traditional ‘On-Premise’ or innovative

‘Cloud Based’ deployment models

Summary & Conclusions• Have we covered your challenges?• New licence model is not quite as bad as some people

had made out• But there are viable alternatives• Frontier has experience and ....

Next Actions• VMware renewal and upgrades• Platform migration

• To alternative vendor• To Frontier private cloud

• Proof of Concept / Tests

Virtual Server Platforms Update

The Royal Exchange23rd September 2011