HP Server for Server 2008

Hi Chris
Thanks for the quick response:
Virtualisation
We currently have sbs2003, which we want to initially virtualise, then split it into:
One server for for exchange, one for dhcp dns, one as a file server, one dedicated to iis.
We will have another three running other database applications and for experimenting on applications that are specific to the organisation.

The users are unlikely to exceed 60, and we will only have a maximum of 30 all working at the same time.

How much RAM should we have, we are happy to put in as much RAM as is needed, prices have come down compared to what they used to be.

My understanding of server 2008 is also that it is much easier to deploy than other server operating systems, is this the case and which is the best resource to use to get to grips with it.

>> How much RAM should we have, we are happy to put in as much RAM as is needed, prices have come down compared to what they used to be.
I would usually recommend 1 - 2GB of RAM allocated per Virtual Machine, since this is the same amount I put in standalone physical servers for running single installations. If you run the core installation of Windows Server 2008, and then run Hyper-V through that, the RAM usage (as Chris said) drops dramatically. The difference is, if you aren't going to feel happy managing such an important server without a GUI (I'm not at this stage on any of mine), then don't do it.

For 4 Virtual Machines, I would be installing 8GB of RAM just for them, and then perhaps another 1GB for the host Operating System. You'll need to remember to install the 64-bit (x64) version of Server 2008 to get it to pick up this amount of RAM. The x64 edition on an x64 CPU is also required for Hyper-V to run.

>> My understanding of server 2008 is also that it is much easier to deploy than other server operating systems, is this the case and which is the best resource to use to get to grips with it.

There isn't that much documentation around, except for on Technet, where Microsoft post all their docs. It would be a good idea to check there, but Server 2008 is, as you quite rightly said, a lot easier to deploy than other servers.

Remember that to use Hyper-V on this server, the CPU on whatever model you get needs to support Intel VT or AMD-V technology, and must be 64-bit.

-tigermatt

> The difference is, if you aren't going to feel happy managing such an important server
> without a GUI (I'm not at this stage on any of mine), then don't do it.

Tigermatt raises an important issue here. Learning to manage Windows from the command line only is a bit of a long journey (at least for anything remotely complex), things aren't quite as consistent as they could be.

There are also a number of oddities to deal with as well. While you can run IIS on Core, you can't run ASP.NET with that because it's reliant on the GUI.

In some cases this isn't a big deal, once you have the base services set up you can remotely manage the server. There are tools available for everything from AD to Hyper-V.

Fortunately for us there's a also program called CoreConfigurator which allows you to fix up the main body of settings without resorting to googling for commands.

http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/guyt/archive/2008/03/22/windows-server-core-coreconfigurator-to-the-rescue.aspx

Personally I'll stick with the command line, however, this at least gives you a bit more choice.

> Remember that to use Hyper-V on this server, the CPU on whatever model you get needs
> to support Intel VT or AMD-V technology, and must be 64-bit.

I had to abandon my experiments with Hyper-V for that reason :) I ended up installing VMWare Server 2, it's still in Beta, but it's free and I find it to be much better presented that Hyper-V. If you're interested in taking a look at that one it's here:

http://www.vmware.com/beta/server/

It's beta though, not an ideal thing to be deploying on a production system.

Chris

>> It's beta though, not an ideal thing to be deploying on a production system

This is a good point, and reminded me to mentioned the fact that Hyper-V is only just released in the past few weeks anyway, so I would still recommend testing it before you look at actually using it in a production environment.

As Chris has brought up, the CPU requirements are generally what break the bank!

-tigermatt

Hi
Thanks for all that information.
I am looking to virtualize using a hypervisor e.g xen hypervisor, vmware virtual centre.
Which means what ever operting system I install will not be on bare metal, it will be the hypervisor, so I am not realy looking at Vmware server 2.

VM Virtual Centre is a management tool, it's not actually virtualisation software itself. So you're looking at VMWare Virtual Infrastructure (ESX 3.5)? It's a good system, but it certainly isn't cheap.

Unless you are running multiple machines on the server there's no real gain to doing that. You have the overhead of the Host system (even if it is just a hypervisor) in addition to the overhead of the Guest. Either way 512Mb of RAM won't really cut it.

What are you trying to achieve? And what will the server be doing?

Chris

Agreed with Chris here. If you don't think your budget can afford VMWare, then you should be looking at Hyper-V instead. I believe it is free, although I'm still running the beta!

Having trouble finding out whether Xen supports Windows 2008 or not, it might work.

Whatever happens, the host does still carry an overhead, no matter how small. There's no point in introducing that extra overhead unless you have a mechanism for either moving virtual machines around, or are running multiple machines on one piece of hardware.

Chris

Ahh there we go. It looks like it works as a hardware VM. You probably found it already, but that's here:

http://www.virtuatopia.com/index.php/Virtualizing_Windows_Server_2008_with_Xen

Of course, how well it'll all work does depend very much on what you expect the guest(s) to be doing.

Chris

I am considering going for the HP ML150 G5 and installing 16gb of RAM as well as configuring RAID 5, the ML370 is expensive.
We are trying to balance getting the right hardware at an affordable price and impimenting virtualization.
We are looking at foundation vmware, I think the microsoft hypevisor is very new in the market and maybe not the one to go for now.
Please let me know your thoughts on the hardware specifications  and whether we should wait for windows hypervisor to mature.

The ML150 is probably just as bad as the other servers down at that end of the market, but for the nature of the organization it probably isn't going to be able to fund an ML370 or higher. Personally, I have used ML110s to great effect in small businesses which only need a single, small server.

If you wanted to use Hyper-V then you would have to test it in a lab environment (preferably using your intended hardware) before putting it into production. I agree with you that it is very new; while it does some incredibly stable and few bugs, there still hasn't been enough time since its official release to comment on this in large production environments.

-tigermatt

Sub-Total,

As we have already mentioned it is critical that anyone tests Hyper-V in a lab environment before they look at rolling it out to their production machines. Hyper-V is out of its Beta now and released to RTM, so it should be reasonable stable and reliable. I have heard good stories so far about the RTM.

I agree with regards to the ML110. You can get it to work - but it is a pain to do so.

-tigermatt

Hyper-V was very reliable in pretty much all Alpha and Beta releases, as such testing in those environments would not have really highlighted many issues.  The issues were moving from one release to another, the virtual machines had to be setup from scratch each time and the integration services had to be reinstalled.

These are issues that you would not expect between Beta and final releases (Alpha maybe), and caused many issues.  I would like to think that now at final release the same issues would not occur (i.e. if a service pack is released).

My RAID controller comments were with regards to the ML150 G5, the ML110 G5 is equally tricky though!

Sub-Total, how did you get hold of Data Center Edition? I thought that was only available to the likes of HP and IBM.

I will accept the split in points as the discussion has been very informative.

You can split the points yourself if you wish, or just let the CV procedure run. Either way, it doesn't matter.

It might be interesting to note that just this week Hewlett Packard have added drivers to their website for the ML150 G5 RAID controller.  I have confirmed that these drivers do work correctly (with all x64 versions of 2008).

I noticed that too. Good to see they are finally getting up to speed with things!

It's still a badged toy rather than a real Proliant though.