Calling on Consolidation

Dell Services helps consolidate the infrastructure

After Maliyil explained the problem to his Dell representative, Dell Services brought in a technical team to study the problem and architect a solution. "The Dell Services team thoroughly analyzed our situation and came up with a comprehensive solution," says Maliyil.

The Dell Services team showed Maliyil how multiple virtual servers could run on one physical server using VMware ESX Server software, how server consolidation onto more powerful servers using virtualization helps to dramatically reduce the number of physical servers in the data center, thus lessening power consumption, and how VMware systems management tools enable a virtual server to be moved from one physical server to another within seconds, helping to make automatic failover a breeze. Maliyil says, "We could get by with far fewer servers, yet our customers would still experience an always-there level of service from us."

Based on the recommendations of Dell Services, Maliyil decided to consolidate all 45 backup database servers onto four Dell PowerEdge servers with dual-core processors. VMware ESX Server software would maintain multiple virtual machines on each physical server running Microsoft® Windows® 2003 and Microsoft® SQL Server 2000 software — a great combination according to Maliyil. "We've seen zero downtime with our SQL on Dell solution, which is key since these servers are mission-critical. And by adding VMware to the Dell solution, we are getting 15 high-throughput virtual servers for every PowerEdge server," explains Maliyil. In addition, Maliyil also adopted Dell's recommendation to consolidate the distributed storage devices on the backup servers onto a Dell/EMC CX500 SAN that would be shared by all the virtual machines. "With shared storage, if a backup database server goes down," says Maliyil, "we can be back online in under a minute because all virtual machines have access to the SAN. And the Dell/EMC SAN also helped us to more easily replicate the machine configuration and user data to remote data centers in Denver."

Dell Services leads a successful migration

Dell Services was an integral part of Data Guard Systems' migration to a consolidated infrastructure. In addition to designing the new infrastructure, Dell Services deployed and tested the new systems. "The Dell team set it all up for me, got everything working, and tested it thoroughly. They really put it through the worst possible disaster scenarios and showed me that their solution worked flawlessly," says Maliyil. In addition, the Dell Services team trained the Data Guard Systems IT staff on how to manage the new system and explained how to best use its many features. "The Dell consultants went above and beyond the call of duty," says Maliyil. "They really did a great job, and the whole process was seamless from beginning to end."

For support, Data Guard Systems chose Dell Platinum Enterprise Support. Says Maliyil, "We've only had to use Dell support one time, and they really lived up to what we expected. That sole incident is a real testament to Dell's quality."

Consolidation lowers the power bill

Given that power limitations were the driving factor behind the consolidation effort, the reduction in power consumption was a striking success. Since migrating to the consolidated server infrastructure, Data Guard Systems is saving as much as US$10,000 a month in power costs.¹ "Our new Dell and VMware solution is projected to reduce the power required by as much as 80 percent, and the resulting savings should be sufficient to pay for the new servers and software within a year. And with the knowledge that we had avoided spending millions on power improvements at three distinct data centers, everyone was pleased," explains Maliyil.

Furthermore, because the four new PowerEdge servers can collectively handle up to 60 virtual machines, Data Guard still has plenty of room to grow. "We can now add 15 more virtual servers without buying a thing," says Maliyil.