It has been a summer of virtualization: the blockbuster IPO of VMWare (VMW) followed by the $500 million acquisition of XenSource by Citrix Systems (CTXS).
For now, the key driving force behind virtualization is money - rather need to save money. “The cost of power in the data center is surpassing the amount of the equipment. It didn’t used to be that way,” Sun Microsystems (SUNW) CIO Bob Worrall told Earth2Tech. And virtualization seems to be one way to tacking the issue:
Virtualization right now is at the tip of the iceberg. It is going to be complementary to solving the whole power problem. It’s a dirty secret in the industry that most data centers today run inefficiently. Virtualization makes it easier for CIOs who want to run servers at 80 or 85 percent. It’s the only way to get there.
Full interview with Worrall @ Earth2Tech.
8 comments so far
7:41 AM PT
I could not agree with you more. The virtualization will dramatically increase productivity and save costs as I had mentioned. Great points Om.
VK
8:26 AM PT
Few months ago CNET ran several stories/videos on power consumption of Google and Microsoft’s data centers. These centers almost looked like a giant factory with stacks of blade servers, standby diesel generators, aisles of UPS batteries and so on. These units require more power to run than an average suburban area.
I think Virtualization is the answer to share resources efficiently. Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) does exactly the same, allows individuals or businesses to share company’s massive hosting infrastructure for a small fee. In fact, Wall Street Journal assert that Amazon’s S3 (storage) coupled with EC2 is a boon to tech startups as it provides inexpensive computing options. Check my blog on this technology for more details:
http://ashishkprasad.blogspot.com/2007/07/amazon-s3-storage-on-go.html
9:09 AM PT
The utility computing model (effectively spearheaded by EC2 & S3) is really going to change the market in the next few years, especially with other companies (including ours) coming into the mix with improved offerings, including fixing some of the issues with Amazon’s first generation system.
In our own tests we have seen up to 90% reduction in power requirements through virtualisation, through a combination of improved power efficiency of larger servers, and more accurately being able to allocate resources against demand, both of which are vital.
We are already talking to a number of people who are interested in using our service who’s business model couldn’t exist without a utility platform, let alone all the others who’s model it will make a lot more financially viable.
10:13 AM PT
This is snake oil technology.
Why can Virtualization “Alone” solve this problem ? What’s in that piece of code that can’t be run in a Windows/Linux/or Solaris?
Fact is, this is a solution looking for a problem, when people are looking for “dirty secrets”, it generally means they couldn’t find any useful ones.
This thing started as a project to run MS software on Linux .. now the project has run amuck and the investor have gone crazy again. Doesn’t anyone remember VA-Linux .. and AOL buying TimeWarner ?
2:32 PM PT
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10:09 PM PT
Virtualization is a wonderful technology. I am looking forward to the increasing utilization of virtual desktops. Will be interesting to see how Microsoft’s new software turns out with the release of Server 2008.
1:53 PM PT
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7:24 AM PT
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