I was thinking in terms of updates on servers. Take a snapshot of the server, apply updates, test the server w/ the updates installed. Delete the snapshot.
Not sure which category of snapshot that falls under (or if I am even using that term correctly). From: Steven Peck [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, July 16, 2012 6:00 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: moving to virtual errr... Do you mean snapshots as in images, or snapshots as inthat thing VMware can do? If the second, be sparing of your use of snapshots to approriate use cases. To many times people are substituting 'snapshots as a means to rollback' in situations where pre-planning and testing is more important (such as Databases, or AD DCs, etc) and then dealing with the consequences of rolling back said snapshot 4 hours later on a domain controller leading to a day of fun fun fun. Steven Peck http://www.blkmtn.org On Mon, Jul 16, 2012 at 1:39 PM, David Mazzaccaro <[email protected]> wrote: Dept of 1 here w/ almost 200 users. So I need it to work, work well, and be supported by someone on the outside. For now backups will be done as they are today (physical box w/ tape drive and BackupExec grabbing the data off each server). The servers I am backing up will just be virtual instead of physical as they are now. Once my old physical servers are decommissioned, we will address backup options. First priority is to get my aging servers (6-7 yrs old) out of the picture ASAP. And grab snapshots of them. From: Paul Hutchings [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, July 16, 2012 3:57 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: moving to virtual Initial thoughts, in no particular order: 3 VM hosts for 8 servers seems excessive You almost certainly won't need 8 cores. RAM and disk IO tend to be bottlenecks before CPU does. Why a SAN and not DAS? If you really need shared storage consider the VMware VSA or HP P4000 VSA. What are you doing for backups? That is one hell of a whack of money for them to do stuff for you that, respectfully, if you buy the kit and take your time I'm sure you could do yourself and come out the other side having learned a heck of a lot. Personally, and I'm only going off this single email I don't know the history, but I would take a step back and perhaps take smaller steps here before throwing that much money at it. ________________________________ From: David Mazzaccaro [[email protected]] Sent: 16 July 2012 8:36 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: moving to virtual Greetings, Getting very close to moving into the VM world, and have a couple of questions... 1) I am trying to figure out if I should go with 8 core or 6 core processors in my 3 hosts for my upcoming VMware environment. The price is about double. And I'm not sure I need 8 cores. The layout that has been quoted is as follows: 3 hosts connected to a PS4100XV SAN running VMware Essentials Plus Kit. The host servers I am looking at are either: HP DL360 G8 2x Intel(r) Xeon(r) E5-2640 (6 core, 2.50 GHz, 15MB, 95W) $5356 each HP DL360 G8 2x Intel(r) Xeon(r) E5-2690 (8 core, 2.90 GHz, 20MB, 135W) $10,061 each I currently have 8 physical servers (Win2003, E2003, Citrix 4.0) that we will be P2V'd. After I P2V the servers, the plan is to begin creating new Windows 2008 R2 VMs and migrating each server's role (2008R2 domain, Exchange 2010, and Citrix XenApp 6.5). I want enough power to be able to run my existing 8 servers in a virtual environment and migrate them to AD2008/E2010/XenApp as well as leave some room for testing and growth. 2 of the vendors said 6 core is fine, another vendor is quoting 8 core processors. 2) The quotes I have for the "services" part of this are: $40,000 ($12k for AD/Exch, $8k for XenApp 20k for VMware) $38,000 (not itemized) $28,000 ($11k for AD/Ex, $6k XenApp, $11k for VM) Do these sound legit? I have ~190 users if that helps. I really think 28k is either too aggressive or simply not realistic. This is the same vendor who quoted me (3) single processor servers, so I have to go back to them and tell them I want dual proc. 3) For the SAN, I have 2 options: PS4100XV (12 600GB 15k SAS) $23,000 NetApp FAS2240 (12 600GB 10k SAS) $22,000 I have 2 vendors pushing the PS4100XV, and the other pushing the NetApp. >From what I have been told, I'll get better IOPS w/ the 15k drives in the Equalogic. And fuller feature set. Any one w/ experiences w/ either of these models want to add their $.02? This is a completely new world for me, so any help is appreciated! . ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ________________________________ MIRA Ltd Watling Street, Nuneaton, Warwickshire, CV10 0TU, England Registered in England and Wales No. 402570 VAT Registration GB 100 1464 84 The contents of this e-mail are confidential and are solely for the use of the intended recipient. If you receive this e-mail in error, please delete it and notify us either by e-mail, telephone or fax. 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