Virtualization Needs vs. Cool Features

July 1st, 2008 by Adnan Hindi

Regardless of the size of your virtualization project you will probably ask two of the most common questions before you even start:

1. What product(s) & version(s) should I use?
2. How much should I plan to spend?

The simplest answer of course is “it depends”. I’ve seen implementations range from a thousand bucks to over several million. Ideally, your virtualization project needs & goals should drive your product selection. The bells & whistles you chose will determine your spending.

10 Basic questions that will help you determine product & cost:

1. Will your Virtual Infrastructure (VI) host production Virtual Machines (VM)?
2. What servers do you already have that can be used as hosts (32bit, 64bit, Mem, Disk, Network)?
3. Do you have a need for High Availability (HA)?
4. Do you have the need to manage SLA’s on your VMs?
5. What will a typical VM in your VI look like (OS, Disk, Mem, Network, CPU)?
6. What other IT resources do you have that can be used (SAN, NAS, Switches, etc…)?
7. What level of comfort does your existing staff have with the various IT resources?
8. Do you have existing hardware/software support agreements with Vendors you could leverage?
9. What tools do you already own that are “virtualization aware” and what new tools will you need?
10. How many VM’s do you plan to scale to?

Please, please, please, don’t make the mistake of implementing features that you don’t need and over-engineering just because the product lets you do so.

If you plan it right your product & cost, questions will be answered with no unpleasant surprises.

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July 1st, 2008