The industry average for utilisation of x86 servers is approximately 7%. With most Windows based applications requiring a dedicated server to run, it is hardly surprising that data centres are growing out of control. Not to mention the fact that any Finance Director being asked to sign off new servers would be somewhat dismayed to know that the existing server investment is being less than 10% utilised.
So how can you improve your utilisation rates?
VMware virtualisation technology makes it possible to package a complete x86 server - hardware, operating system, applications and configurations - into a portable virtual machine package. Multiple virtual machines can then run simultaneously and independently on a single x86 server with consolidation ratios often exceeding 10 virtual machines per host processor
Virtualisation with IBM System x or BladeCenter running VMware Virtual Infrastructure can deliver more than 80% CPU utilisation and dramatically improve the return on investment on your data centre investment.
Storage utilisation can also be improved through consolidation and virtualisation. The IBM SAN Volume Controller (SVC) can pool storage resources and centralise management to drive up utilisation and control growth.
IBM SVC can improve storage utilisation by up to 30% and reduce future growth requirements by up to 20%.
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