What is Virtualization?
Virtualization is a technology that allows you to run multiple virtual machines on a single physical machine. Most servers and systems in use only utilize a percentage of the physical resources available to them. This equals a lot of waste in resources and hardware. The old way of purchasing and maintaining a separate physical server for every need and purpose is quickly falling short to virtualization. Through virtualization, a hardware's full potential and utilization can be realized. Through High-Availability deployments, downtime can be drastically reduced far beyond the capabilities of traditional hardware deployments.
How Does Virtualization Work?
Virtualization, regardless of the solution or platform, operates on a "Hypervisor". A Hypervisor is a thin layer of software that runs on the host hardware to create a virtual environment in which to run virtual machines. The Hypervisor allocates resources on the fly, as configured, and as needed to these host operating systems.
What does this mean? Say for instance you have a server with 16 GIG of Ram and Dual Processors. You have 4 Virtual Servers running; A Domain Controller, Exchange Server, Web Server, and Application Server. Chances are all these servers are not in need of full access to all that memory and processing power at all times. The Web Server may not have heavy traffic at all times, the Domain Controller has alot of idle time in between authentications. Traditionally you have to have those "peak time" resources available at all times just in case. With virtualization the Hypervisor dynamically provides and reallocates resources to the Virtual machines that need it as they need it. This results in much less waste and much more efficient use of resources with typically less hardware to maintain. |
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