Help me spec a hardcore server for VMWare

[meester]

These are my requirements:

host a dozen virtual machines running Windows XP and 1 server doing light file serving duties, very light SQL server. Each XP VM will be about 50GB in size. I currently allocate 256MB of RAM for each VM, but I would prefer to use more.

I need to be able to remote into each of the VMs and the responsiveness should be good. Currently I have a Q9550 workstation with 1TB of storage, 8GB of RAM running VMWare workstation under Windows Server 2008 x64, and with VMWare tools installed things are great locally, but not if I remote into the workstation from my laptop - VmWare tools only works locally.

Hardware redundancy to maintain availability is not important to me, but I do also need a backup solution, as I don't have one currently.

I don't particularly have a budget in mind, I just want value for money

I would particularly appreciate any feedback from people running VM servers on the best thing to install on the server - particularly whether VMWare ESX server is a good option or otherwise Windows Server + VMWare Server.

 

[Paperlantern]

ESX is a good choice. We run ESX on a DL580 with dual Quad cores and 24GB of RAM. Of course we have a slightly higher demand on our server then I think you will. Remoting into any of the 5 servers (Server 2003) or 11 workstations that run on the box is of no issue. All systems respond as if they are thier own physical hardware device. We allot 1GB of RAM for each VM workstation, and 2GB for each server. Not ALL run ALL the time, one or two are shut down sometimes because they are only used for backup or other intermittent testing tasks. It sounds though, that the current server you have would be suitable for your task, you could double your ram for each workstation and still have enough for 1GB on the server VM with a gig to spare.

What are you going to be doing with the workstations? A server with a single quad core and 16GB of RAM would more than likely be just fine for your 12 workstations and one server.

 

[MustISO]

ESX server is the way to go and lots of RAM. Any of Dell's higher end rack servers should do fine.

 

[meester]

Most of the time the workstations would be sitting there doing nothing, but there will sometimes (say 10% of the time) be perhaps 6 or 7 vms each running single-threaded apps, which Task Manager tells me are each using 15% CPU.

Is it a good idea to buy an off-the-shelf server rather than DIY? I appreciate that in an enterprise environment you'd want a rack full of identical servers, on-site same-day support, and for that reason you'd buy HP/IBM/whatever, but 100% uptime/hot pluggability/etc. are complete non-issues for me.

 

[TheStu]

Originally posted by: meester
Most of the time the workstations would be sitting there doing nothing, but there will sometimes (say 10% of the time) be perhaps 6 or 7 vms each running single-threaded apps, which Task Manager tells me are each using 15% CPU.

Is it a good idea to buy an off-the-shelf server rather than DIY? I appreciate that in an enterprise environment you'd want a rack full of identical servers, on-site same-day support, and for that reason you'd buy HP/IBM/whatever, but 100% uptime/hot pluggability/etc. are complete non-issues for me.

I have found that if you are in the market for server hardware, OEM pricing is usually pretty good. Dell's workstations/servers are generally more configurable than others, and if nothing else, it never hurts to have a unified warranty.

 

[meester]

I've got some preliminary hardware ideas for a DIY:

2 * Intel Xeon E5520 - 2 * £280
Intel Server Board S5500BC £265
6 * 2GB Corsair DDR3-1333 HX3X12G1333C9 RAM (I need a multiple of 3, right?) - about £180
x * BARRACUDA ES 7200.2 1TB SAS - 3.5 7200RPM 16MB (Not sure how many of these to buy and how they should be configured)

I guess I need a SAS controller

And vSphere essentials

A basic Dell PowerEdge T410 with a single E5520 and 2GB of RAM comes to £850 inc tax. Their CPU/RAM upgrades are quite expensive.

 

[tynopik]

50gb/vm means you can fit 3 per 160gb X25-M
(1 X25-m / 3 VMs) * 12 VMs = 4 X25-M * $600 = $2400

> VMWare tools installed things are great locally, but not if I remote into the workstation from my laptop - VmWare tools only works locally

use gotomypc or something instead of remote desktop

> host a dozen virtual machines . . . I currently allocate 256MB of RAM for each VM . . . 8GB of RAM

12 VMs * 0.25GB = 3GB

what are you using the other 5GB for?

my suggestion would be to start out with a 6 dimm 1366 board

populate it with 6*2gb for 12gb and an i7 920

this will be faster than your current setup and give you a chance to evaluate how much more cpu power you actually need. then you can upgrade to an i7-975 or a hex core if you really need it when they come out

 

[lxskllr]

You'd want ECC ram, wouldn't you? That'll add significantly to the cost.

 

[tynopik]

> You'd want ECC ram, wouldn't you?

he keeps emphasizing that it's not enterprise/mission critical, so i would say no

in general i would say 'responsiveness' is going to be more driven by the amount of RAM and your storage system than your CPU, especially once you move to nehalem

if you don't want to go the SSD route but you still want really want topnotch performance, you might get a separate (small) HD for each VM so no VM gets bogged down by disk activity from another VM

and then for backup, either a separate computer on the network with a terabyte drive or an eSATA external drive you plug in occasionally for backups

 

[meester]

Originally posted by: tynopik
50gb/vm means you can fit 3 per 160gb X25-M
(1 X25-m / 3 VMs) * 12 VMs = 4 X25-M * $600 = $2400

> VMWare tools installed things are great locally, but not if I remote into the workstation from my laptop - VmWare tools only works locally

use gotomypc or something instead of remote desktop

> host a dozen virtual machines . . . I currently allocate 256MB of RAM for each VM . . . 8GB of RAM

12 VMs * 0.25GB = 3GB

what are you using the other 5GB for?

Windows Media Player, Word, Visual Studio, etc. etc.

 

[tynopik]

Originally posted by: meester

Originally posted by: tynopik

what are you using the other 5GB for?

Windows Media Player, Word, Visual Studio, etc. etc.

that's . . . impressive

i have 4gb total and i'm running a vm with vista with VS2008 (1.4gb allocated), a vm with xp (850mb allocated), a 768MB ram drive and i still have 500MB free

anyways, if you need 5gb for other purposes, going to 12gb leaves 7gb for your vms which allows over 550mb per VM

 

[sunshinetechnology]

Your existing hardware should almost be good enough. It sounds to me like you have another issue that is keeping your VMs sluggish. You mentioned Vmtools only works locally. Can you explain that further? How are you "remoting" into the workstation? RDP? VNC? VMware client?

I think the first thing you should do is get rid of VMware workstation and install VMware server 2.01. You should easily have enough RAM to give each one 512, plus a few GB left over for your server 2008 to use.

Then connect to your VMs using the VMWare Console application or RDP. I think you'll find your current hardware is more than sufficient.

Edit: Forgot to add, ESX is total overkill for what you'd like to do. It requires specific hardware, is expensive, and has a learning curve that is nowhere near VMWare Server. It's great for enterprise and great to run at home if you're going to need ESX skills on your resume, but other than that it's just not necessary.

 

[StevoIBM]

You could also look at the IBM X3650 M2 server.

Has loads of processing power and extremely scalable. Also it does have certification
for ESXi as well. It'll give you everything you need for your virtualization needs.

Hope that helps

 

[her209]

Pickup some used Dell Poweredge 2850/2950s and install VMware ESXi.

 

[meester]

Originally posted by: sunshinetechnology
Your existing hardware should almost be good enough. It sounds to me like you have another issue that is keeping your VMs sluggish. You mentioned Vmtools only works locally. Can you explain that further? How are you "remoting" into the workstation? RDP? VNC? VMware client?

I remote into the workstation using RDP.

VMWare tools says 'you are using a custom pointer which is not supported' when I connect to the machine running vmware workstation over RDP.

I think the first thing you should do is get rid of VMware workstation and install VMware server 2.01. You should easily have enough RAM to give each one 512, plus a few GB left over for your server 2008 to use.

Then connect to your VMs using the VMWare Console application or RDP. I think you'll find your current hardware is more than sufficient.

Yeah that could be.

The problem is that the server/workstation combo doesn't work that well as all the random bits of software I install over time tend to gunge things up, and my nice speedy box seems like a slouch after a few months of use.

 

[sunshinetechnology]

Originally posted by: meester

Originally posted by: sunshinetechnology
Your existing hardware should almost be good enough. It sounds to me like you have another issue that is keeping your VMs sluggish. You mentioned Vmtools only works locally. Can you explain that further? How are you "remoting" into the workstation? RDP? VNC? VMware client?

I remote into the workstation using RDP.

VMWare tools says 'you are using a custom pointer which is not supported' when I connect to the machine running vmware workstation over RDP.

I think the first thing you should do is get rid of VMware workstation and install VMware server 2.01. You should easily have enough RAM to give each one 512, plus a few GB left over for your server 2008 to use.

Then connect to your VMs using the VMWare Console application or RDP. I think you'll find your current hardware is more than sufficient.

Yeah that could be.

The problem is that the server/workstation combo doesn't work that well as all the random bits of software I install over time tend to gunge things up, and my nice speedy box seems like a slouch after a few months of use.

Make sure your mouse pointer is the default one and not the one using shadows or something weird. If that doesn't work, ensure that your hardware acceleration is set to "Full".

Go to display properties, Select the Settings Tab, Select the Advanced Button, Select the Troubleshoot Tab. Slide the Hardware Acceleration Tab all the way to Full. See if that helps.

I'm not sure how VMWare workstation works, I haven't used it for years, but the servers I've used a lot. In VMWare Server you use the console to connect over the network...much like RDP but it's better I think. I don't think you'd have this issue using the server version since you don't even have to use RDP.