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ITinEuropeVIRTUAL DATA CENTREA special European edition of Virtual Data Centre e-zine | searchvirtualdatacentre.co.uk

JULY 2011, VOL. 1, NO. 2

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Make plans up front to include governance, businessprocesses and infrastructure designs into yourvirtualised data centre—or face the consequences.

PPLLUUSS:: 5 WAYS TO IMPROVE

VIRTUALISED SERVER INFRASTRUCTURE

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WHEN IT COMES to deploying a virtualised data centre infrastructure, youneed a plan to stay on track and avoid getting derailed. Advance plan-ning pays off, says Daniel Eason, who advises IT professionals to createa plan for hardware, storage, networking and governancewell in advance. As more European companies turn to virtualisation to enhance their

environments, it is important to generate a solid IT roadmap and focuson key areas such as architectural governance, technical design, vitual-isation’s role in current and future business processes and, most impor-tant, budget management for virtualisation projects. If you plan for theworst, you can anticipate most disasters and avoid unwanted road-blocks such as vendor lock-in and dried-up funds.Whilst putting your plan together, consider your timeline and budget.

Ask yourself if your plans are realistic. Have you been seduced by prettyflashing lights that you can’t afford, don’t need and don’t have time todeploy? Remember that you’ll present your roadmap to the person who’sholding the purse strings, so be prepared to justify your purchases.In addition to an overall strategy, this e-zine advises you on the man-

agement aspects of your virtual environment once it’s deployed. EricSiebert writes about keeping your system healthy by being wary of secu-rity hazards and virtual machine sprawl. Then, Rick Vanover, an IT infra-structure expert, gives you five tips for running a smooth operation bymaking incremental adjustments that boost performance levels.If you choose not to set aside adequate time to plan a virtual infra-

structure deployment strategy in advance, chances are you’ll regret it.Ensure you get things right the first time by being prepared for what-ever comes at you and your team. �

Kayleigh BatemanSite Manager, SearchVirtualDataCentre.co.UK

VIRTUAL DATA CENTRE EUROPE E-ZINE VOL. 1, NO. 2 • JULY 2011 2

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Virtual Infrastructure:Don’t Skip the Small Stuff

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Sketching Out Your Virtual DesignMake plans up front to include governance,business processes and infrastructure designs

into your virtualised data centre—or face the consequences.

BY DANIEL EASON

HILE SERVER virtualisation adoption is on therise, solid data centre planning and design process-es are sometimes considered an onerous time sink.But virtualisation technology changes various areasof IT and thus requires much more architecturalplanning and strategic considerations than doesthe legacy architecture that preceded it. With virtualised resources, a data centre envi-

ronment is more dynamic and less transparent than a physical datacentre environment. So, IT pros need to think about their environmentsand architecture designs at the very beginning of the project plan-ning period.Without a firm design strategy in place, a data centre environment

can easily fall prey to management and performance problems—from virtual machine (VM) sprawl to poor consolidation ratios andspotty server and application performance. Ultimately, these designproblems compel IT to focus on troubleshooting tasks rather than ongood management and governance of a virtualised infrastructure.IT managers are encouraged to consider various aspects of data

centre architecture up front, including the following:

� IT roadmap strategy� IT governance� Project or business process alignment � Technical design criteriaConsidering these elements in advance of virtualisation deployment

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or expansion gives data centre professionals a better chance to gettheir environment right the first time.

Mapping It OutBefore organisations can deploy or increase their use of virtualisa-tion, the first order of business is to consider their IT roadmaps andto start the deployment process knowing that virtualisation tech-nologies should be able to support any strategic business require-ments. In constructing an IT roadmap, IT professionals should indentify

the following:

� Current areas of infrastructure that pose operational or technicalproblems, such as the lack of service-fulfillment processes or dis-aster recovery capability for virtualised workloads.

� Existing business constraints and productivity gaps that can be reme-diated by introducing virtualisation features.

� Areas of business or IT processes that will benefit from new tech-nological investment, such as disaster recovery or self-servicecapabilities.

� External factors and IT innovation to ensure that your business isahead of the curve and business competitors.

Once data centre managers assess their IT environment and graspits initial scope, they should compile a timeline-driven document andpresent it to business and IT stakeholders. This document will be thefoundation for gaining business-line buy-in and for making the finan-cial case for virtualised resources. Then roadmap activity can be sched-uled into an IT portfolio and deployed as distinct IT projects.Regarding virtualisation, an IT roadmap should focus on these key

areas:

� engaging business- or application-based IT stakeholders to estab-lish potential future requirements for VM services (for example,the implementation of an enterprise resource planning system);

� establishing future hardware platform choices and replacement

options for server hardware that will soon reach end-of-life status;

� third-party vendor roadmaps for changes that can affect existingtechnology and create vendor lock-in; and

� potential licensing and software renewal schedules for conflictsand problems.

As you draft your roadmap, the first question to ask is this: Is thelevel of transformation and the timeline of your roadmap realistic? Consider the answer in light of how well IT and the business side

can adapt to change. If you believe that a three-to-five-year plancan’t be reached because the time horizon is too far out, focus on amore accomplishable, shorter-term roadmap of 12 to 18 months toacclimate staff members and enable them to become familiar withthe roadmap process. Finally, IT managers should present the roadmapto various organisational leaders within IT and the business side togain acceptance and sponsorship.

Architectural GovernanceFor IT managers, technical architectural governance is a key consid-eration, and it’s important that stakeholders propose their own guide-lines and come to an agreement on any policies that IT architectspropose. In virtualised environments, this might involve sizing forVM service offerings or new service-request fulfilment. An example of a basic governance policy to work towards—and

one that most organisations do unconsciously—is to agree on a cor-porate-wide VM-first adoption policy. A VM-first policy stipulatesthat any new server or application request should be hosted on a vir-tual machine platform; physical server deployments, on the other hand,should require executive-level sign-off. Gaining acceptance for this kind of policy is not simple, and suc-

cess requires promotion and an education process for the entire organ-isation. Consider the following tactics for doing so:

� Promote to internal users the business benefits of VMs from acommercial and availability perspective.

� Educate the business side and evangelise on the time-saving ben-


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efits of using virtual machines, such as reduced server provisioning times.

� Gain acceptance from application teams to ensure that they fullysupport a consolidated virtual infrastructure.

To reduce VM sprawl, a solid governance policy is also key. In phys-ical environments, it was easy to control server deployments givenslower procurement and deployment times. But in a virtualised envi-ronment, VM sprawl can become a real concern and often accom-panies rapid deployment of VMs within an organisation. You’ll needto institute control and governance mechanisms over VM deploy-ments, and a rock-solid request process is paramount.To counteract VM sprawl, organisations just starting on the virtu-

alisation journey should consider implementing new VM requestprocesses. Petitioning for a VM can then be filtered via service desk


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Same-Page Training for Virtualisation StaffALTHOUGH SERVER VIRTUALISATIONand data centre consolidation provide excep-tional technical benefits, you should also recognise that operations need tobe integrated into existing processes to support a virtualised environment.From a service management perspective, virtual machines are sometimestreated like physical servers when it comes to routine tasks such as planningmaintenance downtime and disaster recovery scenarios. To change this mentality, IT managers should offer workshops to explain

the following areas:

� a RACI (responsible, accountable, consulted, informed) matrix for knock-ing down the traditional divisions between virtualisation administratorsand other infrastructure admins;

� key areas that can change given the benefits of virtualisation (such ashost hardware upgrades);

� changes made to service-level agreements.

tool sets to monitor the total volume of requests and to ensure thateach business requirement is justified and IT-approved. More mature organisations should consider investing in self-ser-

vice automation tool sets with standardised, pre-set VM images forapplication use. This system gives IT the opportunity to delegateresponsibility and to retain control of the centralised adopted policyfor items such as VM size or the length of time a user will have accessto a VM.Consider offering strategically sized “T-shirt-like” categories for

VMs to predetermine VM sizes as well as the number of applicationsused, amount of memory used and so on. These preset categoriesprevent IT managers from having to struggle with constant overallo-cation and to prevent one VM from hogging resources.

Business Process and Project AlignmentAt the start of a server virtualisation undertaking, data centre man-agers should work towards reducing the risk that the project couldturn into an overly complicated and misunderstood endeavour. Con-sider beginning an engagement process with incumbent project man-agement teams to explain the technical and process differencesbetween “virtual” and “physical.”Key areas of focus should include:

� Automation/deployments.Make the relevant processes for changeand external VM dependencies, such as IP/naming, a priority.

� Implementation tasks. Certain activities required for implementa-tion will no doubt be made redundant within physical estates. In mostcircumstances, VMs will be deployed into a pool of resources withno dependency on physical infrastructure.

� Risks. Running within a shared multi-tenant virtual environmentmeans you must be vigilant about identifying risks. Be sure to struc-ture and document processes clearly so that all parties have visi-bility and can feel more comfortable that risk is being mitigated.

� Budgeting and the business case. Provide education on costs thatmay change from being mainly opex- and capex-based. Give con-sideration to ensuring that software licensing is appropriately licensed


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for a virtualised estate.

� Capacity management.Make leaner and meaner a goal in your vir-tualised world.

Your project will be judged on how successful and efficient it is atvarious stages and, once completed, at meeting its goals. Pay atten-tion to the above criteria to avoid key measurables being affected inorder to deliver the new technology under budget and on time.

Technical Design ConsiderationsWith shared multi-tenancy of virtual servers, the funding model forhardware differs from the model for which individual physical serversare procured. IT managers need to ensure appropriate funding for allareas of infrastructure that support virtualisation. It’s relatively easy to secure sufficient finances with the following

methods:

� Per-virtual machine costs: This number is calculated based on thetotal cost of supportive host infrastructure—such as storage, net-works and so on—divided by a total number of VMs on a singlehost.

� Chargeback: This system is more common in US regions. It usestool sets to bill users and business departments for virtualisationservices based on resource usage, such as CPU, RAM and storageconsumption.

� Showback: Using the same tools that were used in a chargebacksystem, IT divisions sometimes favour showback because of itscost visibility for internal IT budget holders who can then assesswhere most of the IT budget is being spent.

With any costing model, be sure to factor in future growth. Youmay also need to educate stakeholders about the various standardhardware requirements for a virtualisation estate. In addition, con-sider the different licensing models to ensure that VM software licens-ing is compliant.Design considerations in a virtual data centre include planning for


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operations, hardware, storage and networking.

Operations.Within a virtualised data centre, it’s critical to developcore operational competency built on virtualisation administrators’skill sets. Virtualisation admin roles have evolved from conventional server

admin positions to become more skilled IT roles that encompassdiverse infrastructure knowledge. So, in this role, core competencyrequires less single-minded skill devoted to infrastructure hardware

and, instead, a new knowledge of howthe “logical layer” (the virtualisationlayer) integrates with and affectsexternal components, such as net-working and storage. IT managers need to give serious

thought to capacity managementtools, which provide visibility into thearchitecture and enable proactiveplanning of the IT roadmap and budg-et. Capacity management also givesIT the opportunity to assess whethervirtual machines were originally right-sized, rather than oversized, andwhether they even need additionalresources allocated to performaccording to agreed-upon perform-

ance levels.

Hardware.After introducing, deploying and smoothing out the kinksof virtualisation technology in your organisation, the critical next phaseis to ensure that teams select the most appropriate IT resources tosupport existing and future virtualised workloads. Needless to say,selecting the right server hardware platform—one capable of sup-porting existing VM workload requirements and future expansion—is exceedingly important.

Experts and IT users alike have long debated the type of server archi-tecture best suited for hosting virtualised workloads. At the defini-tion stage, IT managers should perform due diligence on server plat-forms and choose the most appropriate for their organisation.


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Capacity manage-ment tools give IT the opportunity to assess whether VMsneed additional resources allocated to perform accordingto agreed-upon performance levels.

From a high-level perspective, blade servers have gained popular-ity within data centres and rackmount servers are still a known quan-tity and often a more popular choice for data centre architects. Consider the following when selecting a server hardware platform:

� Scalability and density: Establish your VM sizing requirementsand application architecture. Typically blades are used for low-den-sity scale-out VM deployments, whereas rackmount hardware canfacilitate a denser VM-to-physical-server consolidation ratio.

� Budget: Ensure that underlying hardware can be further deployed,and consider the platform’s cost and licensing factors. Blade serverstypically incur larger up-front capital cost expenditures than do rack-mount servers.

� Connectivity: Do you require per-port visibility into the cost ofSAN/LAN infrastructure used for services with rackmount servers?Or can you split or recharge the cost of using a shared-blade back-plane infrastructure, as you do for VM pricing?

� Security:Do you have security compliance controls in place to ensurephysical segregation of servers (a requirement for, say, PCI compli-ance)?

Not all companies have the budget to procure new hardware. So ifyou have existing servers that can support virtualised workloads,consider server reuse as well as consolidated server platforms fordisaster recovery to reduce total hardware costs.

Storage. Virtualisation abstracts not only the underlying physicalserver hardware but also the storage array to hosts with VMs. Thisabstraction provides benefits such as the ability to mix various stor-age area networks that have a variant disk media type and accessprotocol. But it also creates new management issues. Consider the following storage-related concerns:

� Performance: Selecting the most appropriate storage protocol toaccess VMs is paramount. Consider hosting test and developmenton networked storage and production VMs on Fibre Channel or emer-gent Fibre Channel over Ethernet-based arrays.


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� Disk media: If possible, invest in arrays that include the opportuni-ty to use enterprise flash disk. Having such capability will allow youto virtualise additional resource-intensive workloads in the future.

� Third-party integration: Ensure virtualisation vendor applicationprogramming interface (API) support and integrate with storagearrays.

� Disaster recovery/backup:Make certain that arrays and suppor-tive software for array continuity are virtualisation-aware and fullysupported by your virtualisation vendor.

When it comes to storage selection, the above are just some of theissues in a virtualised environment. In addition, be sure to bridgegaps between storage and virtualisation design teams. In this vein,consider holding design workshops to ensure that all your IT teamsunderstand and will plan for future growth. Also, because virtualisation operates with storage arrays that are

likely multi-tenant, storage architecture teams should have com-plete visibility into expected workload IOPS (I/O per second) thathosted VMs require so as not to affect other running services.

Networking. In a virtualised environment, networking is probablythe least-used I/O, but it shouldn’t be neglected. Instead, IT man-agers need a bulletproof strategy for the logical configuration andmanagement of virtual switches (vSwitches) that provide VM con-nectivity.Virtualisation technology has far more centralised management and

visibility into server networking and security, and management APIsoffer greater opportunity to centrally manage VM configuration witha policy-driven strategy.With converged networking technologies, provisioning a virtualised

and physical infrastructure is possible and provides new opportuni-ties. The latest converged infrastructure management technologiesgive IT managers a much greater ability to define and orchestrate theimplementation of network configuration policies to support physi-cal networking. They can also perform logical virtualised switch net-work configuration for VLANs and quality of service. Whether it’s Ethernet or SAN, physical and virtualised connectiv-


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ity has conventionally operated in silo fashion. Convergence aims toremove such silos through more holistic management of shared serv-ices that run on physical infrastructure or a virtual hypervisor.If you’re planning a new virtualised environment, get rid of existing

silos between virtualisation and network teams. In the past, both teams would learn about the other’s technology

at the design stage to finalise an agreed-upon design. With the intro-duction of third-party virtual switch capability, vSwitches can bedesigned and operated at the virtualisation layer in the same waythat physical switches are. Third-party switch architecture is famil-iar to designers and IT operations and reduces operational complex-ity and streamlines regular tasks, such as migrations or disaster recov-ery scenarios.Finally, think about how you monitor networking performance

within your virtualised network. Management tool sets provide a holis-tic view of performance levels of virtual machine network traffic.Management and performance reporting will also improve root-causeanalysis and visibility into potential issues between VMs and the phys-ical services that are not feasible to virtualise.

Planning Pays DividendsSolid virtualisation planning and design help you right-size your ITinfrastructure and prevent budget-busting decisions or purchases thatcreate vendor lock-in. While IT pros may be hesitant to invest the timein these planning and design phases, these tasks pay exponentialdividends as you deploy and manage your virtualised infrastructure.For IT managers who find the foregoing discussion daunting, here

are some last pieces of advice:

� Educate anyone who works with policy on the benefits and justifi-cation for any of your proposed strategy.

� Develop solid analysis and evidence to gain acceptance of your vir-tualised infrastructure and trust from stakeholders.

� At a minimum, get clarity on IT spending—even in basic form—fordepartmental knowledge, not organisational knowledge. �


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Virtualisation Infrastructure Monitoring:

Eat Your VeggiesMonitoring for virtual machine sprawl, security risks and resource bottlenecks is like eating your spinach:

It ensures a healthy virtualisation environment and keeps downtime to a minimum.

BY ERIC SIEBERT

onitoring your virtualisation environmentis the cornerstone of maintaining your infrastruc-ture’s health. And, let’s face it: Many virtualisationadministrators fail to pay adequate attention tosecurity, resource requirements and virtual machine(VM) monitoring tasks that their environments

require. Giving these factors short shrift can invite security breach-es, VM performance problems and system downtime.So pay attention to the finer points of virtualisation deployment proj-

ects and learn how to secure, populate and monitor your environ-ment.

Securing Your Virtual EnvironmentWhen implementing a virtual environment, administrators often failto take the time to properly secure the environment, which is a bigmistake. Most bare-metal hypervisors are reasonably secure out of the box,

but there is always room for improvement. In addition, it’s fairly sim-ple to make a hypervisor less secure by changing default settings orthrough misconfiguration. Security is amplified in a virtual environ-ment, where a single physical server runs many virtual servers, andinadequate security on a physical server can directly affect the secu-rity of all virtual servers running on that host.

M


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Traditional security practices don't always apply to virtual envi-ronments, and there are special considerations you should be awareof. My advice is to take the time to understand security in virtualenvironments and apply recommended security settings to all thecomponents that make up your virtualisation environment, includinghosts, VMs, networks and management servers.

Protecting host servers cannot beemphasised enough. Think of a hostserver as a castle with VMs protect-ed inside it. If an attacker compro-mises your castle’s defenses, he gainsfree access to everything inside aswell. You should do everything you canto make sure your castle’s defensesare adequate, and do not forget to putwater in the moat and raise the draw-bridge. Many third-party vendors offersecurity products specifically to mon-

itor and secure VMs, hosts and virtual networks.Often, security administrators are wary of virtual hosts because of

the increased security risks and some misperceptions about whatmakes VMs insecure. Take the time to explain to your security teamhow security works in a virtual environment. Also, outline the extrasteps you have taken to further protect hosts and VMs. Once youeducate them about virtual security, they should be more comfort-able and willing to work with you.

Populating a Virtual EnvironmentIt’s easy to create a VM—in fact, it’s too easy. VMs can cause sub-stantial problems once they propagate. One of the biggest problemsin virtual environments is VM sprawl, or the uncontrolled growth ofVMs in a virtual environment. Star Trek fans may recall how the cud-dly aliens in the popular episode “The Trouble with Tribbles” repro-duced so quickly that they threatened to overwhelm the host ship’sfood supplies. VM sprawl is similar in that virtual machines are often created

without regard for the resources that they consume and, thus, theseVMs can overwhelm the host server’s resources. To address sprawl, you can implement one of the many products

Many third-party vendors offer securityproducts specificallyto monitor and secure VMs, hostsand virtual networks.

that support chargeback and the creation of reports on resource usagefor virtual environments. In addition, limiting the number of peoplewho can create VMs and establishing a formal process for request-ing new VMs can prevent sprawl and unmonitored machines. You should consider requiring justification for requests for any

new virtual machines and institute an approval process to force usersto think twice about whether they need to create new VMs. Finally,creating resource pools helps limit the amount of resources availableon your host servers for new VMs.It’s important to control sprawl early on. Otherwise, before you know

it, you may use all your host resources and create bottlenecks thatreduce the performance of VMs. Make your IT staff aware that VMsare not free and that they bring an associated cost, regardless of howthey are configured. Having tight controls on your virtual environ-ment is the key to limiting the growth of virtual machines on hostservers.

Monitoring Your Virtual EnvironmentTo ensure that a virtualisation environment stays healthy and func-tions properly, monitoring it is imperative. Often, problems may not


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Tool UpHERE ARE THREEof the most flexible, feature-rich virtual infrastructure mon-itoring tools:

� Quest Software’s vFoglight.This virtualisation management tool hasperformance monitoring, capacity planning, chargeback and servicemanagement.

� Veeam Monitor. This tool provides the data needed for troubleshoot-ing, trend reporting and capacity planning.

� VKernal vOPS Performance Analyzer. This tool determines abnor-mal trends and root cause, impact and resolution of immediate VMperformance issues.

http://www.vkernel.com/products/performance-analyzer/overview

http://www.veeam.com/vmware-esx-monitoring.html

http://www.quest.com/vfoglight/

be obvious, and a good monitoring system alerts you to them so theycan be resolved. In virtual environments, even small problems canhave major effects because so many VMs run on a single host, andthey all have to contend for that host’s resources. So don’t ignoremonitoring; without it, your virtual environment may be trying to tellyou something that you’d never know about if you weren’t listening.

You should monitor severalthings: performance, server hard-ware and virtualisation software-specific alarms and events. Hosthardware failures can be disruptivein virtual environments despitetechnologies such as high avail-ability and fault tolerance designedto minimise system downtime.Knowing when a fan, drive or mem-ory module has failed, and actingupon it, minimises disruptions toyour environment.

Virtual machines compete for host resources, and a single bottle-neck can greatly undermine VM performance. Resource bottlenecksare not always obvious, and monitoring the performance of hosts helpsidentify lurking bottlenecks that need correction. When monitoringVM performance, rely on tools that are designed for virtual environ-ments because many operating system tools such as Windows Per-formance Monitor are not aware of the underlying virtualisation layerand may give inaccurate results on certain counters and measure-ments.Often, the root cause of a performance issue is not obvious and

can have a ripple effect on virtual machines and host servers. Con-figure monitoring into your environment and understand the metricsand data that are reported to proactively eliminate bottlenecks andother problems. Many third-party tools for monitoring and reportingare more robust and powerful than the tools that are built into virtu-alisation products and greatly enhance monitoring abilities. �


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Resource bottle-necks are not alwaysobvious, and monitor-ing the hosts helpsidentify lurking bottlenecks that need correction.

performance

Five Ways to ImproveVirtualised Server

Infrastructure PerformancesTo keep virtualised server infrastructure performance

at a high level, admins must continually tweak components. Here are five tips for optimising a

virtualised server infrastructure. BY RICK VANOVER

YSTEMS ADMINISTRATORS are always search-ing for incremental performance enhancementsand operational efficiencies to fine-tune a virtu-alised server infrastructure. As such, making seem-ingly minor adjustments and tweaks can ensurethat a complex virtual environment maintains high

performance levels for users and clients.There are five things nearly every administrator can do to optimise

a virtualised server infrastructure's effectiveness. Even though someof these practices may seem small in scope, they can greatly affectyour infrastructure performance.

1 Boost virtualised server infrastructure performance with file server consolidation.

File servers can be a big pain point for administrators. Often, whenfile servers are consolidated from physical systems, they’re simplyconverted and loaded onto a virtualised server infrastructure. As aresult, administrators miss an opportunity to delete, consolidate andorganise potentially unstructured data. So let’s consider a slightlydifferent approach to optimise file servers. One option is to use a storage area network (SAN) to perform file

server functions. Many storage systems can serve as a Common Inter-


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net File System (CIFS) endpoint on a network for an easy connectionto an Active Directory domain. This method virtualises all of your fileservers.Another consideration is to use a cloud-based virtual file server.

With this approach, you should allocate approximately 10% of yourfile server storage to local machines and archive the other 90% inthe cloud. From a functionality standpoint, a virtual file server pres-ents all the stored data as if it were stored locally on your network.Furthermore, a virtual file server can connect to Active Directory andsupport full NT File System permissions for easy management, sim-ilar to physical servers.The final option is to run a virtual machine (VM) as a file server. In

this configuration, you should consolidate the computer names toreduce the number of file servers. Windows systems are capable ofserving multiple computer names, or NetBIOS names, that usersconnect to through a short name (eg, \\ServerName).Many administrators prefer a large file server instead of adminis-

tering multiple, smaller file servers. Windows servers can serve addi-tional NetBIOS names by adding the OptionalNames value in theHKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\LanmanServer\Parameters area of the Windows registry.

2Disband Microsoft clustering.It’s common to convert a pair of servers running Microsoft ClusterService (MSCS) into a VM. MSCS provides application-level failoverwithin a VM that isn’t possible with VMware High Availability andFault Tolerance. But this arrangement may be redundant for manyvirtualised server infrastructures.For VMware environments, MSCS is one of the few configurations

that requires a raw device mapping virtual disk in lieu of the popularVirtual Machine File System data store. This setup complicates stor-age provisioning but in a minor fashion.Disbanding clusters in MSCS, however, has a hidden benefit: You

can reduce your licensing costs. (See “To Disband a Cluster...” onpage 19.) Your Windows systems are probably licensed at the Enter-prise level or higher. If the MSCS cluster is moved to a VM that runsWindows Server Standard, you can lower your licensing renewal costs.

To Disband a Cluster...DISBANDING A CLUSTER involves removing each member and then remov-ing the controller. Before removing each member, you should set the mem-ber offline and drain existing connections.

1 In the Application Center snap-in, right-click a member.

2On the pop-up menu, point to All Tasks, and then click Remove Server from Cluster.

3 Repeat steps one and two for each member (except the controller).

4After you have removed all members from the cluster, right-click the controller.

5On the pop-up menu, point to All Tasks, then click Disband Cluster.

6 Click OK to confirm disbanding of the cluster.

When a cluster is disbanded, the applications and other content are stillintact on the controller. Only Application Center features are stopped. �

SOURCE: MICROSOFT

3 Improve OS management in your virtualised server infrastructure.

Fine-tuning your virtualised server infrastructure with various man-agement tools and processes can pay major dividends in terms ofinfrastructure performance. For instance, having clean Group Policyconfigurations with limited local customisations is a best practiceand makes for very quick server deployment through a VM template.Enterprise system management software also helps virtualised serv-

er infrastructure deployments. Most virtualisation administrators don’twant to set up program installations map network drives and localisedconfigurations.And while Active Directory’s Group Policy is sufficient for most small

environments, larger environments use Microsoft System Center,


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Altiris and Novell ZENWorks management utilities. These tools coor-dinate application delivery and manage interaction with guest virtu-al machines via policy.

4Plan antivirus scans of your virtualised server infrastructure.

There are several commonplace practices in nonvirtualised environ-ments that snowball into major issues for consolidated virtual envi-ronments. To circumvent notorious antivirus scanning problems, forexample, consider a policy that performs a full-system antivirus scanat 3 am on Sundays for every server (assuming that’s not a busy timefor your organisation in some other part of the world). You can alsoapply this principle to physical servers because their processors arelikely idle at this time.Additionally, antivirus scans can raise concerns in SANs because

they place a tremendous amount of strain on local processor inven-tory. If you rearrange the pieces in a virtualised server infrastructure,you'll realise that the host processor inventory is severely affectedwhen every guest simultaneously runs a full scan.To fix this issue, stagger scans across a group of VMs. Schedule 15

VMs for a 3 am scan, for example, another 15 VMs for 5 am, and soon. It’s important to schedule these scans in such a way that tech-nologies like VMware’s Distributed Resource Scheduler can migrateworkloads based on cluster compute capacity.

5Forgo P2V conversions for new builds.A physical-to-virtual (P2V) conversion is a straightforward process,but a new build is always cleaner. In Windows systems, a P2V con-version leaves many residual configurations—such as hardware driv-ers, unnecessary software and file system clutter—that can adverse-ly affect system performance.To achieve the optimum performance from new systems, it’s best

to deploy a new VM and provision the required software, includingthe reinstallation of custom applications, transferring code and con-figuration information, and database restores on new database servers.Still, P2V conversions are very useful because many administratorsdon’t have the time to perform a new build. �


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Daniel Eason is aninfrastructure architectat a multinational com-pany. He also has a per-sonal technology blog

(http://www.vmlover.com) and isbased in the UK.

Eric Siebert is a 25-year IT veteran who spe-cialises in Windows andVMware system admin-istration. He is a guru-

status moderator on the VMwarecommunity VMTN forums and main-tains VMware-land.com, a VI3 infor-mation site. He is also the author ofthe book VI3 Implementation andAdministration, from Pearson Pub-lishing. Siebert is also a regular onVMware’s weekly VMTN Roundtablepodcast.

Rick Vanover([email protected])has vExpert, VCP,MCITP, MCTS andMCSA certifications. He

is an IT infrastructure manager forAlliance Data in Columbus, Ohio, andan IT veteran who specialises in vir-tualisation, operating system supportand technology management. FollowRick on Twitter @RickVanover.


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about the authors

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