DailyTech - What are the Biggest Drawbacks to Virtualization?

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DailyTech Poll Discussion What are the Biggest Drawbacks to Virtualization?
Brandon Hill (Blog) - August 17, 2009 8:46 AM

8 comment(s) - last by .. on Aug 22 at 12:41 PM

What are the biggest drawbacks to virtualization?

Performance – virtualizing slows everything down. (743 votes)
37%
Lack of redundancy – placing multiple virtual machines on a single piece of hardware is risky. (390 votes)
20%
Complexity – virtualization has a lot of “moving parts,” so there’s more to go wrong than with a single nonvirtualized machine. (239 votes)
12%
Cost – it’s not always the least expensive way to go. Watch out for hidden costs! (187 votes)
9%
Drawbacks, schmawbacks! Virtualization just rocks. Enough said. (439 votes)
22%
1,998 total votes

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Can I suggest...

By Motoman on 8/17/2009 12:49:04 PM , Rating: 5

...an option for all of 1-4? While any individual item is a problem, it's the fact that all of the first 4 items happen at the same time that is the true problem...

Well..

By PorreKaj on 8/18/2009 1:22:05 PM , Rating: 2

Its not the lack of redundancy. Virtualisation kan be expanded over several machines. fx we have a little blade center with 4 blades running about 12 servers ( just started at work so dunno for sure ) if one blade blows op. WMware will just automaticly assign the virtual servers to the other blades. instantly - without interupting the user ( dunno how it works. but i was told they could move their Exchange server without any problems, thats sewius bussines )

cost might be the only real answer here. Because if you have enough money - performance won't be a problem either.

RE: Well..

By Mjello on 8/20/2009 12:53:11 PM , Rating: 2

If you have any sort of SQL on them id urge you to not trust VM. If the server actually fails completely, hot migration dont work.

That will almost certainly make data corruption on a busy database. VM failover only works fully as long as the machine has something to migrate from. Otherwise its like pulling the plug on a normal server and then booting it again. Not a wise thing to do with a SQL under load.

Use clustering whenever there is critical data. It is a good thing combined though. Except for the extra complexity.

Parent

Licensing

By Integral9 on 8/19/2009 9:02:37 AM , Rating: 2

Some licenses are MAC address bound. Since the hardware is virtualized, this poses a problem for those licenses.

hmm...

By solgae1784 on 8/19/2009 9:32:57 AM , Rating: 2

Having worked with virtualization, I can say that performance should be "almost" a non-issue with virtualization nowadays - as long as you remember to use products like ESX/Hyper-V/Xen, not host-OS-based virtualization products like VMware server, VMware workstation, or MS Virtual Server. I say "almost" because there are a few applications that is not suitable for virtualization, and even if it is, most likely you will see "near native" performance due to overhead - even if the overhead is supposedly very small. Security and high availability can be set up to be just as secure and highly available as if you were running all physicals - any virtualization vendor or experts will be willing to help you with that.

The real problem is poor planning. Looking at just one side of things is what breaks virtualization project. You are essentially rebuilding your whole infrastructure, so you need to look at the whole picture - network, storage, security, servers, facility, power, and more.

Also, be warned that newer CPUs are much better for virtualization than the older CPUs. You can search for "hardware virtualization nuts and bolts" article and many more articles about virtualization in anandtech, but bottom line is, if you're going for virtualization, you may need to buy new servers. Make sure you do your homework to see if the initial investment will pay off in the long run. Then again, your servers may be due for a hardware refresh anyways.

suggestion

By michaelklachko on 8/20/2009 6:38:12 PM , Rating: 2

I think you have to specify if you are talking about:

1. Regular users running Linux on their Windows desktop with VMware Player, or running XP on Windows 7 with Windows Virtual PC,
OR
2. Engineers running server virtualization in datacenters with ESX or Xen

Because answers from those two groups will differ.

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