Datasheet

Part I: Ready, Set, Go with VMware Infrastructure 3

reliable and stable a platform VMware Infrastructure 3 is. Being skeptical by

nature, I went slowly at first, but I quickly began to trust VMware the more I

worked with it.

Virtual machines: The non-physical

workhorses

For all intents and purposes, virtual machines are just like physical machines.

You can log on to them; and they have BIOS, hard disks, memory, CPUs,

operating systems, and applications. In fact, if you connect remotely to a

machine, you’ll never know that it’s virtual unless someone tells you. Virtual

machines work and behave just like physical machines. Even the machines

themselves don’t even know they are virtual!

Virtual machine pluses and minuses

Aside from all the general benefits of virtualization (covered in the

“Benefitting from VMware Infrastructure 3” section, later in this chapter),

here are the major pluses for using virtual machines:

 They can be rebooted much faster than physical machines. I was able

to reboot one server in 15 seconds!

 They are more simpler than their physical counterparts. For instance,

there are no array controllers to configure in the virtual machines.

 They are easy to back up and restore. The entire machine is stored in

a set of files.

Unfortunately, there are also downsides. However, you can easily minimize

the downsides:

 Support can be a gray area. Some software vendors might tell you,

“Hey, it’s on a virtual machine. We don’t support that.” Pay for VMware

support and know your own operating systems to mitigate this risk.

 Troubleshooting can be a little tricky. People troubleshooting a prob-

lem on a virtual machine might incorrectly deduce the problem is

caused because the machine is virtual. As long as you hone your own

troubleshooting skills, this risk is minimized.

I had a consultant tell me that the most likely problem with a report

running slowly and having connectivity issues was because the server

was virtual. I had to prove to her that it was the report — not the virtual

machine — before we could resolve the issue.

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