Server Virtualisation


IT departments are being asked to do more with less, and the best way to play that game is resource utilisation. Server virtualisation can help reduce the amount of physical hardware, reduce energy consumption, reduce heat on server rooms, and free up valuable server rack space.


Some analysts estimate that average IT departments utilise only 5% to 25% of their servers' capacity; by employing server virtualisation to utilise underutilised, servers can yield immediate cost savings, and potentially ongoing savings.


There are many benefits to consolidating the number of Windows servers in your environment by taking advantage of the many different server virtualisation products (i.e. VMware and Windows Virtual Server) on the market. These include:

  • 1. Lower number of physical servers - you can reduce hardware maintenance costs because of a lower number of physical servers.
  • 2. By implementing a server consolidation strategy, you can increase the space utilisation efficiency in your data centre.
  • 3. By having each application within its own "virtual server" you can prevent one application from impacting another application when upgrades or changes are made.
  • 4. You can develop a standard virtual server build that can be easily duplicated which will speed up server deployment.
  • 5. You can deploy multiple operating system technologies on a single hardware platform (i.e. Windows Server 2003, Linux, Windows 2000, etc).
  • 6. By taking advantage of server virtualisation you can easily improve the efficiency of your Windows Data Centre, as well as lower your cost of ownership.

Why Choose VMware for your Virtualisation


While virtualisation in general can bring you many advantages, VMware virtualisation solutions are built on a robust foundation proven in production environments and chosen by over 250,000 customers, including 100% of the Fortune 100. Built on VMware vSphere, the industry's most advanced virtualisation platform, we enable solutions from the desktop to the data enter, utilising existing IT investments. Our solutions can be integrated with your overall IT infrastructure and existing management tools. If that's not enough, we also have the lowest total cost of ownership than any competitor.


Desktop Virtualisation


Delivering desktops as a managed service lets you create a more flexible IT infrastructure so you can help your business respond more quickly to market changes and opportunities. Deploy applications and desktops faster and more consistently to a wider variety of clients, lowering costs while improving service levels. Extend the life of legacy applications and eliminate installation conflicts by virtualising applications. For remote and branch offices, move your desktops into the cloud and deliver them as a managed service wherever they're needed while retaining the control and security you need.

  • Streamline deployment and management by delivering desktops as a service.
  • Virtualise Windows applications for easier OS migration as you package once, deploy everywhere.
  • Give secure remote access to teleworkers and temporary workers without sacrificing performance or security.

Virtualising Enterprise Applications


Even demanding applications like Exchange and Oracle can be virtualised, letting you meet and exceed the performance of physical servers while eliminating the need to overprovision. Meet your service levels and maximise infrastructure efficiency with VMware vSphere, which dynamically allocates resources as your applications need them. Set up a standardised service catalogue to deploy applications in minutes for on-demand provisioning while ensuring consistency across application instances. Check out our list of vendors who officially support their applications running on the VMware platform, including Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, and many more.

  • Double the performance of your Exchange by running all Exchange server roles, including the mailbox server, on VMware vSphere.
  • Consolidate SQL on vSphere to cut costs by 50% while accelerating database delivery and ensuring database Quality of Service.
  • Virtualise SharePoint so you can easily scale up resources on the fly, move workloads as needed and deal with planned maintenance with no downtime.
  • Run Oracle databases, middleware and applications on vSphere for improved time-to-market and total-cost-of-ownership.

Technical Virtualization Best Practices


Enabling virtualisation throughout the IT infrastructure


VMware virtualisation works with a wide variety of hardware and software, including storage, networking and security products. We are committed to an open standards-based approach to licensing and interoperability so you can use the solutions that best meet your needs without being locked in to specific vendors. Our Technical Resource Centre gets down to the nitty gritty details about the major components of the virtual infrastructure.

  • Streamline Security and compliance are paramount to successful virtualisation. Our vShield line gives you better-than-physical security, from the edge to the endpoint. Learn more about virtualisation security.
  • Virtual networking uses physical networking features, standards and principles. VLANs let you scale your traffic types yet maintain complete isolation on the same physical networking hardware. Learn more about virtual networking.
  • Virtualising storage enables high-performance access to shared storage resources and creates efficiency of storage arrays used. Learn more about storage management for virtual machines.
  • Enhance the performance of your applications by fully understanding best practices in deploying and optimising a virtualised infrastructure. Learn more about virtualisation performance.