how powerful is VMWare ESX?

kerbydogg

hey guys,

I've been wondering if there's some kinda equation to calculate the number of VMs on a pretty decent server.

for example:

ESX on a Intel Xeon Quad Core, 32GB of RAM, connected to SAN storage.

say each VM will be 512MB of RAM.

Can it host 60+ VMs?
lol if it can that's freakin crazy~

or is like 30ish more reasonable?

If you guys have any links that can point me in the right direction that'll be great. I'm starting to get really curious about virtualization.

dynamik

http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_35/esx_3/r35/vi3_35_25_config_max.pdf

That PDF lists the maximums if you're curious, but realistically, you can have as many VMs as you have resources.

30-60 VMs seems like a lot for a single quad-core Xeon. If you have a bunch of Linux servers running custom applications that are only occasionally used, you probably could get that number with those specs. It depends on your resource utilization, but generally speaking, I think 15 VMs/core seems high. They'd have to be idle most of the time for that to work.

It'll be interesting to see how things are looking a year from now. We're probably going to be seeing CPUs with eight (or more) cores in dual- and quad-socket configurations.

What other sort of information are you looking for? You're not going to find a guide that simply says, "You can have X number of VMs running with such and such hardware." You're going to need to monitor your resource utilization and determine your numbers based on that.

astorrs

For server virtualization of Windows Server 2003 on ESX/ESXi 3.5 I've found using 3-5 VMs per core with 2-4GB of physical RAM per core is pretty accurate for 95% of installations.

So in other words a dual quad core Xeon (8 pCPUs) with 32GB of RAM should allow for somewhere between 24 and 40 virtual machines (this is assuming each VM is 1 vCPU). While these numbers are a good starting point the only way to know for sure would be to use a tool like PlateSpin PowerRecon (or similar) to gauge the current resource utilization of your physical servers.

royal

astorrs wrote:

For server virtualization of Windows Server 2003 on ESX/ESXi 3.5 I've found using 3-5 VMs per core with 2-4GB of physical RAM per core is pretty accurate for 95% of installations.

So in other words a dual quad core Xeon (8 pCPUs) with 32GB of RAM should allow for somewhere between 24 and 40 virtual machines (this is assuming each VM is 1 vCPU). While these numbers are a good starting point the only way to know for sure would be to use a tool like PlateSpin PowerRecon (or similar) to gauge the current resource utilization of your physical servers.

I was about to post *incoming post from astors* but you beat me to it.

But anyways, Hyper-V > ESX.

Let the drama begin!

astorrs

royal wrote:

But anyways, Hyper-V > ESX.

Let the drama begin!

Did you see this? http://www.microsoft.com/emea/teched2008/itpro/tv/default.aspx?vid=64

Richard Garsthagen is a evangelist for VMware in Europe and at the end of the video - which was filmed by Microsoft at TechEd EMEA - he slaps an "I VMware" sticker (from the Dutch VMUG contest) on the back of the Microsoft guy.

HeroPsycho

royal wrote:

But anyways, Hyper-V > ESX.

Let the drama begin!

There is no drama. You're just wrong.

bwcarty

It depends on the applications running on the virtual machines. Look at the maximum CPU, memory, and disk I/O operations for each server, imagine them all spiking at the same time, and weigh that against your proposed ESX host. If you can afford to throttle some servers back to ensure that other servers get the resources they need, you can run a few more VM's.

One ESX server isn't very fun or safe, though. A single major hardware failure would wipe you out. Run one more host than you need to keep things running smoothly, store the VM's on shared storage, and let DRS distribute the load fairly aggressively. When you have that setup, life is good.

astorrs

bwcarty wrote:

and let DRS distribute the load fairly aggressively.

How aggressive do you like to be? 1, 2, 3, 4, or only 5 star recommendations? I usually stick to 3.

RTmarc

HeroPsycho wrote:

royal wrote:

But anyways, Hyper-V > ESX.

Let the drama begin!

I concur.

bwcarty

astorrs wrote:

bwcarty wrote:

and let DRS distribute the load fairly aggressively.

How aggressive do you like to be? 1, 2, 3, 4, or only 5 star recommendations? I usually stick to 3.

I go one more notch on the aggressive side and let DRS handle any recommendations with 2 or more stars.

undomiel

I do 3 stars over here. The aggressiveness has caught me off guard before with some applications maxing out their virtual cpu.

Sunshine_54

Lol, I don't know how anyone can say Hyper V > ESX. VI3 has far more features and has far better performance. But anyways, don't want to get into a flamewar My 2 cents.

HeroPsycho

Sunshine_54 wrote:

Lol, I don't know how anyone can say Hyper V > ESX. VI3 has far more features and has far better performance. But anyways, don't want to get into a flamewar My 2 cents.

+1

dynamik

Sunshine_54 wrote:

Lol, I don't know how anyone can say Hyper V > ESX. VI3 has far more features and has far better performance. But anyways, don't want to get into a flamewar My 2 cents.

Because it's funny to see people get worked up over something like this in online forums

To be fair, it is about needs. ESX does lose a lot of its impressiveness when its reduced to a single box in a small business. I do like Hyper-V on my lab machine as well. It runs the VM with Virtual Center that I use to work with my two ESX boxes

undomiel

It's probably better to say HyperV > ESXi.

HeroPsycho

undomiel wrote:

It's probably better to say HyperV > ESXi.

How so? ESXi can still do more with the same hardware, has memory sharing optimizations, and an easier transition to full Virtual Infrastructure in the future. And it's free.

I'd do ESXi over HyperV, too.

astorrs

HeroPsycho wrote:

undomiel wrote:

It's probably better to say HyperV > ESXi.

How so? ESXi can still do more with the same hardware, has memory sharing optimizations, and an easier transition to full Virtual Infrastructure in the future. And it's free.

I'd do ESXi over HyperV, too.

I've gotta agree with HeroPsycho on that one too.

HeroPsycho

YEAH! *signals high five to astorrs*

royal

Virtual PC > ESX imo.

astorrs

royal wrote:

Virtual PC > ESX imo.

RSX-11 > Hyper-V

:P

HeroPsycho

royal wrote:

Virtual PC > ESX imo.

Your mom runs Virtual PC!

OOOOOOOOH SNAAAAAAAAAAAP!

Mishra

701 > ESX

http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/701/701_coi62.html

astorrs

bertieb

I've been away from the forums for a few days whilst on SQL 2008 training and just spotted this one. This sure is one funny thread guys!