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AIT Implements Server Virtualization Program
When the IT department's server center at AIT Worldwide Logistics nearly reached its maximum capacity and threshold for heat and electricity, Dan Chesler, manager of systems administration and support, knew something needed to be done.
Acknowledging that the heat generation was not only harmful to the servers, but also to the environment as well as the organization's cost-effectiveness, Chesler and his team set out to find a solution for these concerns.
"Our long-term goal was to come up with a solution that extends the life of AIT's data center without increasing the electrical consumption and carbon footprint of our company," explained Chesler.
Initially, AIT launched a pilot program with a Microsoft solution. However, upon its implementation, Chesler became discouraged to discover that the product wasn't manageable from an architecture and enterprise management standpoint.
"It was static and time-consuming in that administrators had to manually assign specific percentages of memory, storage and network bandwidth to each application," he said.
Chesler was interested in seeking out a solution that automatically allocates resources without requiring constant maintenance and interruption in AIT's day-to-day business continuity.
He began evaluating options in November of 2007, and found his answer in March of 2008 with the implementation of a centralized solution called VMwareŽ, software that runs multiple independent virtual servers and operating systems on a single physical machine.
In essence, when hard drives, network interface cards or power adaptors fail, VMware software is specifically built and designed to dynamically migrate data over without human involvement or business interruption.
Using what is called a blade center - the physical architecture which can host up to 14 separate servers - AIT has managed to slash its hardware acquisition, maintenance costs and energy bills.
"This project has created a much more stable environment for AIT and our customers because we are no longer dependant on a physical server," said Bill Reichman, vice president of information systems for AIT. "If one of the blades becomes defective, the software simply moves the virtual server to another blade and nobody but our support team knows we even experienced a problem."
Because of its modularity and adaptability, the blade center not only suits a virtual environment very well, but it also supports AIT's green initiatives.
"The reductions in electricity used and in heat output are true benefits to AIT and the environment," said Reichman. "This project also enables AIT to extend the life of its data center for many years into the future."
According to Chesler, AIT has saved significantly on overall IT costs by consolidating its resource pools and eliminating 31 physical servers from its existing infrastructure.
Before the server virtualization project went into production, the total wattage of electricity utilized by AIT servers clocked in at 49,162 WATTS. Now, they operate on 31,468 - a difference of 17,694.
What's more, the total amount of BTU's (British Thermal Units) per hour before project implementation was 173,738 as opposed to 113,362 per hour after project implementation - a difference of 60,376.
From a disaster recovery standpoint, Chesler says that while it once took hours or even days to restore and recover servers, now it only takes his team approximately 30 minutes - a drastic reduction in time, manpower and resources spent before implementing the server virtualization project.
"Implementing the server virtualization program has undoubtedly reduced complexity, improved business continuity and increased energy efficiency for AIT," said Chesler.
Top 5 benefits of server virtualization
There are many benefits to consolidating the number of Windows servers in your environment by taking advantage of the many different server virtualization products (i.e. VMWare and Windows Virtual Server) on the market. These include:
- Lower number of physical servers - you can reduce hardware maintenance costs because of a lower number of physical servers.
- By implementing a server consolidation strategy, you can increase the space utilization efficiency in your data center.
- By having each application within its own "virtual server," you can prevent one application from impacting another application when upgrades or changes are made.
- You can develop a standard virtual server build that can be easily duplicated which will speed up server deployment.
- You can deploy multiple operating system technologies on a single hardware platform (i.e. Windows Server 2003, Linux, Windows 2000, etc).
By taking advantage of server virtualization you can easily improve the efficiency of your Windows Data Center, as well as lower your cost of ownership.
Source: ITWorld.com, http://www.itworld.com/nls_windowsserver050411
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