Server virtualization is an extremely powerful tool that can help you make the most out of your server environment. But just how exactly can you benefit by going virtual? We asked our experts to come up with some of the uses that would benefit your business. If you haven’t considered what virtualization can do for you, now’s the time to think about it. Here are top seven uses for virtualization our experts came up with!
1. Multiple OS’s on one system.
Your entire infrastructure is run on Linux servers, except this one legacy ASP application that requires a small Windows box. Why dedicate separate hardware for this when you can just put a virtual Windows machine on a server that’s also running a Linux VM?
2. Go green!
You might have a few servers in your environment that aren’t being fully utilized. Condense them as virtual machines on a single physical server. This eco-friendly solution helps you “go green” by putting money in your wallet—it costs you less to use less hardware and build out virtual servers.
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Congratulations! If you’re reading this, you’re likely the proud owner of a website that’s crossed into the territory of requiring either high-availability or additional performance.
Let’s assume, for the sake of this example, your web tier is running .NET and your database is running on a separate stand-alone server. If you’re still running both your web and DB tier on the same server, you should separate those roles before reading any further. The methods for scaling a web tier are generally not compatible with having a combined web/db tier.
Whether the goal is reliability, performance, or both, you’re going to need some way of balancing or directing incoming load to your web site across multiple servers. This is generally done with a hardware load balancer. It can also be accomplished through many varieties of software load balancing or DNS tricks, but there are many limitations you’ll face.
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There are many RAID levels to choose from, and it can be helpful to know how the levels differ. While RAID-1 and RAID-5 are probably the most well-known, other common levels include: RAID-0, RAID-6, and RAID-10. Here’s a rundown of these levels and what they offer:
RAID-0 combines two or more disks to increase performance and capacity, but there is no fault tolerance. A single disk failure will result in the loss of all data on the array. RAID-0 can be useful when fault tolerance is not necessary and a high value cost/performance balance is required.
RAID-1 is most often deployed with two disks. The disks are mirrored – providing fault tolerance. Read performance is increased while write performance will be similar to a single disk – if not less. A single disk failure can be sustained without data loss. RAID-1 is often used when fault tolerance is key and there isn’t an exceptional space or performance requirement.
RAID-5 provides fault tolerance and increased read performance – though write performance often suffers. A minimum of 3 disks are required. RAID-5 can sustain the loss of a single disk. In the event of a disk failure, the data from the failed disk is reconstructed from parity striped across the remaining disks. Due to this, both read and write performance is severely impacted while a RAID-5 array is in a degraded state. RAID-5 is ideal when space and cost more important than performance.
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When choosing a datacenter to host your company’s environment, it’s important to consider all the variables that will come into play. Many times, a site tour of your potential datacenter will show you a limited picture of the center’s inner workings. If you don’t arm yourself with the proper questions to ask or the right things to look for during a tour, you could potentially choose the wrong datacenter. Some typical datacenter security questions include “Is there an authentication system to get into the datacenter?” and “do you have camera systems throughout the datacenter?” Although these are excellent questions, they don’t begin to scratch the surface of what you need to know.
Here are the top 10 things to consider when choosing and/or determining the security posture of a datacenter:
1. “Do all datacenter walls extend to the roof?”
This is very important. If the walls don’t extend to the roof, an intruder needs only to push a couple ceiling tiles out to bypass the physical security and enter the datacenter.
2. “Does the datacenter/building require 2-factor authentication for access?”
These days, single factor authentication just doesn’t cut it when it comes to security. We all know how easy it is for an employee to lose their FOB or badge somewhere, and that means a potential bad guy can find it and let himself in.
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INetU Managed Hosting is proud to bring you our new Server Smarts Blog.
Server Smarts is meant to be a new communications vehicle for us to share some of our leadership strategies and insights into Internet technologies and best practices with our peers and clients. We believe one of the main elements which sets INetU apart from the competition is the way we relate with our clients. We take the time to learn about each client’s business objectives which helps us establish a powerful, long-term relationship with them. This approach has been very successful for us, and is a big reason why our clients say that we are more like a partner than a vendor.
INetU understands the roles efficient Web applications and fast performing databases play in a site’s success. We provide “under the hood” consulting at the database and code level so you get the best performance possible out of your systems, and we’ll share some of our consulting strategies here.
Through the blog, you’ll be able to read posts from some of our most knowledgeable people from our Operations team. These SMEs (subject matter experts) will make new posts frequently on subjects ranging from performance monitoring to virtualization. We’ll also offer helpful articles from outbound newsletters, press releases, and our monthly “Brain Byte.”
Stay tuned for our first post, due out Thursday, March 19th.
