Intellectual Property Statement

Copyright Timothy Antonowicz, 2006. This work
is the intellectual property of the author.
Permission is granted for this material to be
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Server Consolidation:
Real People Saving
Real Money
Timothy Antonowicz
Systems Administrator
Bowdoin College
Background
Bowdoin College
 IT environment
 Expanding Technology Requirements
 New Resource Needs

Spring 2004
Service Demands
 Datacenter Resources
 Projected Growth

Service Demands

Test and Validation Infrastructure
 No
standard test and validation environment
 No development arena

Ease of Management
 Increasing

demands, Static staffing
Higher Availability
 Fault
tolerance, Quicker response
Datacenter Resources

Space and Resources
 Floor
and Rack Space Limited
 Power/UPS/AC Taxed
 KVM Capacity Stretched

Replace/Retire Old Servers
 Service
costs exceeding replacement
Projected Growth

New Financial System
 MSSql/IIS
based Application
 Terminal Services for Mac users
 HA/FT design requirement

Extensive List of Projects/Servers
 Projected
6-8 new servers
Problem Statement

We need to find a solution to our space
and resource problem.
 Address
Hardware and Physical limitations
 Support our diverse systems environment
 Provide best use of staff resources
 Consolidate to better utilize server resources
Hardware Requirements
High Density, Rack Mount
 Console-KVM-Cabling
 UPS-Power-AC
 Redundancy-FT-HA
 Industry Standard

Hardware: HP Blades

High Density
 40
servers in 36U Rack
ILO for KVM and media
 Integrated Power Enclosure

 Redundant AC

feeds and power supplies
Integrated Switches

no direct cabling
 Redundant network paths
Software Requirements

Flexibility
 Multiple

OS support
Management
 Ease
of Use
 Rapid deployment
Backup and Recovery
 Industry Standard

Software: VMWare ESX Server

“Bare Metal Install”
 Licensed
per server, not per VM
 Each VM assigned the same virtual hardware
 VMs portable between different ESX servers
Image and Deploy servers in minimal time
 Multiple Drive States

 Use

of “REDO” for changes
VM is comprised of 2 files for backup
Task List
Build ESX infrastructure on HP Blades
 Create Testing infrastructure
 Migrate/Retire older servers
 Build new Financial System
 Build for future growth
 Change the mindset of IT at Bowdoin

Task: Put ESX onto HP Blades

Build knowledgebase for both products
 Install
ESX on older DL380s
 Install Windows and Linux on Blades
Bring together both technologies
 Integrate into Bowdoin’s infrastructure

 Mount
common NFS share
 ISO and binary storage
 Backups, both physical and virtual
Task: Create Testing Infrastructure

Build virtual servers as “sandboxes”
 Programmers
and developers
 Application support and upgrades
 Standardization of platforms
 Backup and recovery
 Self-service option
Task: Migrate or retire old servers

Replace older hardware with virtual
 Application
upgrades on VMs
 P2V migration for static servers

“Plan for Virtual, move to Physical”
 New
upgrades or migrations are done to
virtual servers first. If more resources are
needed, it is moved to a blade at that time.
Task: Financial System Buildout

MSSQL-IIS Application base
 Mac
users will need access
 Must be Highly Available at all phases
 Fault Tolerant
 Proven patches and updates
 Flexible, able to scale as needed
Financial System Solution

16 servers, both physical and virtual
3
Blades, in an Activex3 SQL cluster
 2 VMs: NLB IIS cluster for Web access
 2 VMs: NLB TermSvc cluster for Mac users
 1 VM: Application Management server
 4 VMs: Staging servers: Sql, IIS, App, TS
 4 VMs: Testing servers: Sql, IIS, App, TS
Task: Build for future growth

Create Server Images
 Gold
Win2k3 and Linux servers
 Scale ESX servers for growth

VM resource allocation
 Scale
servers at a common base
 Increase disk, memory, CPU as needed
 “Added resources make happy customers”
Task: Change the mindset of IT

“Plan for Virtual, move to Physical”
 Projects
begin with virtual servers
 Charge/spec for “Server Resources”

Prove patches and upgrades in VM
 Beat

up on a Clone
Spread the wealth
 separate
file, web, and databases for security
Bowdoin Systems Today
46 X86-based servers
 15 HP BL20 Blades
 9 ESX servers on 8 Blades +1 Dell tower
 118 X86-based hosts
 66 of them are VMs, or 56% virtualized

Savings

Cost of each Blade: $6,250.00
 Includes

Disk, Memory, Dual Proc, etc.
Number of additional servers:
 66
virtual-9 ESX servers=57

Cost to provide physical Servers

57 x $6,250= $356,250.00

** Bowdoin did not purchase servers in FY05-06
Conclusion
Server Consolidation is here and now
 Consolidation can be done by anyone with
a little time, resources and determination
 The benefits can be dramatic
 Your boss will be happy

Questions?
HP Blades
 VMWare
 Bowdoin College
 Red Sox starting rotation

Thank you for attending

Tim Antonowicz
Systems Administrator
Bowdoin College
1-207-725-3723
[email protected]