Virtualization has become a very hot topic in IT organizations. As more and more solutions enter the market the discussion is shifting away from if it should be used and toward how it should be used and what vendors should you work with. CiRBA recently published an excellent white paper designed to help IT executives choose the right virtualization technologies for their business.
All virtualization technologies help towards the common benefits of optimizing the utilization of hardware, and software leading to benefits like cost reductions, more flexibility and better business continuity.
The challenge in all this is that each virtualization technology operates in a slightly different manner, and these differences are more or less pronounced depending on how they are used. This is compounded by the fact that every IT environment is different, each having unique operational patterns, technical compositions and business constraints. To cap this off, every virtualization vendor is highly motivated to win business in their own way, which changes the economics of the situation. Of all the trends currently emerging, the desire to avoid an expensive solution when a cheap one will do is relatively high on most people’s lists.
Choice is good. It seems that there is a new entrant in the virtualization space on a weekly basis, which gives organizations more and more flexibility in how they transform their environments. The net of all this is that there will probably never be one “best” virtualization solution for all occasions, and this is consistent with the fact that there has never been one “best” hardware platform to use across the data center. Look in any large server room and you can quickly get a feel for the effect that constant innovation, free markets and unique application requirements have on what people buy.
I can’t promise you that this white paper will answer every question you have regarding choosing the right virtualization technologies. Yet it will help you map out the questions you need to consider before build your short list of possible virtualization technology vendors. You can download this white paper here. You may also want to read a recent artitcle called “Tip for Planning a Successful Virtualization Migration.” If you have seen other great white papers please share them with your colleagues in the comment area below.
Posted under CiRBA, Data Center Virtualization, Virtualization Case Studies, Virtualization Products / Reviews, Virtualization Strategies, White Paper, virtualization
This post was written by admin on October 16, 2008
