Endpoints
Blog Series Part 1 of 5: 10 Reasons Not to Virtualize
Virtualization and private cloud have enabled server consolidation, created more flexible environments, and saved companies a ton of money. Virtualization is a good thing. But it’s not always a panacea.
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Virtualization and private cloud have enabled server consolidation, created more flexible environments, and saved companies a ton of money.
Virtualization is a good thing.
But it's not always a panacea. Trend Micro’s recent survey of 1200 companies with more than 500 employees showed that 59% had server virtualization in production or pilot. But based on my more than a decade of virtualization experience with large enterprises and service providers, and my time running strategic planning for one of the largest 2 virtualization vendors, this blog series covers 10 types of situations when you should consider not virtualizing some of your applications.
For readability, I've broken this into a short blog series with 5 posts.
I. When you have static, predictable computing needs
In this case, you’re probably already operationalized and stable, so you’ll see little benefit to making a change that could introduce more complexity and downtime…unless of course your stable environment requires an older, no longer supported operating system. When that happens, you don’t have much choice but to virtualize anyway and accept the transition costs and complexity.
II. When you can’t get a virtualization friendly license
If you use specialized software with a license that is not supported on virtual machines, you have a conundrum. You could always virtualize and not tell the vendor, but it’s inconvenient and maybe even illegal. In either case, it means taking a risk. It also means support problems unless you replicate your virtualized system back onto a physical server just to get the support you need. It’s usually less work to negotiate a new VM-friendly license with your software provider.
Coming up in the next post: reasons 3 and 4.