KEY POINTS:
The Government Communications Security Bureau is just one of a growing number of organisations switching to virtualisation technology as a means of maximising server use.
At the same time, IT equipment makers are scrambling to cash in on the virtualisation rush. This month Dell began selling an expanded range of virtualisation-enabled servers and consulting services.
Connect spoke to Dell's Sydney-based PowerEdge server product manager, Stephen Hemsworth, about the corporate world's enthusiasm for going virtual.
Connect: Why are businesses embracing virtualisation?
Hemsworth: The initial reason anybody virtualises is because of the cap-ex [capital expenditure] savings. They can go from 100 servers down to 20 or 10. Then there's the op-ex [operational expenditure] saving people are realising as they adopt virtualisation more and more. It costs less to run these systems, they use less power, there is less data centre management and IT staff are freed up. They're not running around managing 100 servers, they're managing 10.
Connect: What is Dell's strategy for meeting the virtualisation demand?
Hemsworth: Firstly we need to look at how can you implement it really simply, really quickly, and grow it. Ideally what you want to see - and what Dell is producing - is a virtualisation platform: servers that are optimised [for virtualisation], so they're going to run better, take less power, are going to be easier and quicker to deploy, and are going to give you better performance. Storage that is optimised too, and [Dell has virtualisation consulting] services which people can take as much or as little advantage of as they like.
Connect: How do you deal with "virtual sprawl" - the problem of virtual networks becoming large and difficult to manage?
Hemsworth: People are understanding now that the proliferation of virtual machines is very much the same as the proliferation of [physical] servers. VMware now has a "lifecycle management" product which allows you to set policies and procedures for deploying virtual machines. Lifecycle manager allows the IT director or the chief information officer to put policies in place to say you cannot deploy a virtual machine unless it has gone through a sign-off, because, even though they are easy to deploy, there are costs to deploying them.
Connect: How will virtualisation evolve in the future?
Hemsworth: I think you'll see an expansion of what we've just released. The building-block approach to storage will be adopted everywhere, so it will be very easy to expand your storage and add it into your virtual network.
* Simon Hendery travelled to Sydney as a guest of Dell.
