In this “Wave 2” of accelerated server virtualization, the objectives are to maximize business benefits by adopting virtualization in both operations and management, thus creating new efficiencies and cost-savings in both CAPEX and OPEX. Is it true that simply increasing server virtualization can enable a business to attain these goals? The truth is that server virtualization only offers real benefits when complemented with the right IT infrastructure, especially the storage platform.

      Wave 1                      Wave 2

   (2005-2009)              (2008-2013)

Why the Right Storage Infrastructure is Key

In the “Wave 2” of server virtualization adoption, organizations will deploy more and more virtual machines to operate their Tier-1, mission-critical applications. Without proper planning, however, this “Wave 2” could result in virtual machine sprawl, inefficient scaling and rapidly-increasing storage complexity that plague data centers and undermine business results. That’s why the key to success in this “Wave 2” of server virtualization is the ability to tackle increasing workloads from virtual machines and ensure mission-critical systems are able to run with the highest levels of reliability and scalability. That can only be achieved by implementing a robust and dynamic storage infrastructure, because only the right storage infrastructure can continuously provide scalable capacity, power and manageability to accept and manage ever-increasing workloads. In fact, it has been proven that the right storage infrastructure enables server virtualization to achieve a penetration rate of more than 30% in a data center.

Five Elements of the Right Storage Infrastructure

According to numerous customer cases and an industry study, the right storage infrastructure must include five core elements: data provisioning efficiency, storage tiering flexibility, scaling dynamism to multiple dimensions, the ability to support virtualization in a heterogeneous environment and 100% reliability.

1.Data provisioning – enables on-demand resources to flexibly and effectively improve application performance and capacity utilization.  

2.Storage tiering – simplifies storage administration across multiple internal and external storage frames, ensuring predictable performance for different storage tiers through the economical placement of data.  

3.Scaling architecture – empowers multi-faceted scalability that allows storage capacity to expand without boundaries so that it can easily adapt to changes in the virtual server environment, dramatically improving time to market, manageability and cost-savings.  

4.Storage virtualization for multi-vendor platforms – the capability of the storage infrastructure to support third-party solutions, enabling it to extend virtualization to them and existing disk arrays. This is important to maximize your ROI in heterogeneous environments and prolong the useful life of existing assets.  

5.100% reliability – according to Symantec’s 2011 Virtualization and Evolution to the Cloud Survey, performance issues and reliability have now emerged as the top concerns keeping enterprises from placing Tier-1, mission-critical applications on virtualized servers. Although storage vendors can seldom guarantee 100% data availability, this is obviously a crucial factor in the smooth operation of Tier-1 applications.

The “Coevolution” of Storage and Virtualization

The next wave of server virtualization is here. Virtualization is undoubtedly a core element of IT infrastructure whether it is for cloud or traditional deployments. Looking ahead, the number of virtual machines hosting mission-critical or cloud applications will continuously increase and rapidly generate a ripple effect that will impact every aspect of data center operations. To keep pace with this evolution, server virtualization vendors such as VMware are continuing to develop new features and solutions that enhance the performance and efficiency of virtual machines.

However, server virtualization is a game-changing technology—a technology that is constantly evolving to meet the non-stop growth of data and applications and release them from the limitations of a physical infrastructure. The only way to truly move beyond these limitations is to focus on the coevolution of the associated storage infrastructure.

For example, the recently unveiled VMware vSphere® 5 is configured with new built-in enhancements that are designed to offload processes onto the storage array. To support these new features, organizations must choose a storage infrastructure that can provide unparalleled performance and capacity to support this extra workload, as well as the capacity to handle the even-greater virtual machine density, flexibility, efficiency and performance demanded by future VMware environments.

Protect your Investment by Choosing the Right Storage Platform

To protect your investment and remove the risks of virtualizing mission-critical applications in the second wave of server virtualization, you need to partner with a trustworthy, forward-looking storage vendor that is constantly evolving its technologies with leading server virtualization platforms.

World-leading storage vendors like Hitachi Data Systems can provide storage virtualization products such as Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) which offers functionalities and performance to help you meet the challenges of “Wave 2”. Unlike the more rudimentary storage platforms available today, Hitachi VSP is the only storage system that can provide the ability to scale up, out and deep, as well as integrate with existing server infrastructure, and flexibly adapt data for performance and capacity in a multivendor environment. In addition to its dynamic provisioning, dynamic tiering, and 100% data availability, Hitachi VSP is the best solution for the many new IT challenges created by the next wave of server virtualization.

In fact, Hitachi was early in predicting that tight integration between storage and servers would be the key to accelerating and expanding server virtualization initiatives and, most importantly, removing the risk associated with virtualizing Tier 1 applications. That’s why Hitachi fully supports technologies such as VAAI that enable this integration across all of its platforms, and delivers the performance necessary for greater consolidation of virtual machines, which lowers capital and operating costs.

By depending on proven storage technology, you can effectively assure the reliability, availability and performance of all your virtualized mission-critical applications. By being better prepared for the greater consolidation needs of virtual machines in future server virtualization waves, you can take action today to fundamentally protect your existing investment and reduce future capital and operating costs.