You may be asking yourself what virtualization has to do with call centers. Well, if you are looking to get the most from your hardware investment, you should consider virtualization.

Here are some benefits of server consolidation through virtualization.

* Less power consumption

* Less power used to cool the server room (or closet)

* The ability to separate servers in they’re own environment without buying new hardware.

* The ability to move the virtual server to new hardware during maint. windows or due to hardware failure.

* Easy to backup, and recover.

During my time as an IT Consultant i have deployed several Virtualization technologies. VMWare, Microsoft Virtual Server, Microsoft Hyper-V, and Citrix XEN. The differences in functionality are there, but not enough to really provide a distinct advantage. Especially with systems that run the HyperVisor at the lowest level. such as XEN and Hyper-V. or the ESX server from VMware. Any of these may be a fit for your environment, and it comes down to what you are familiar in supporting. Being a Microsoft nut, i prefer Hyper-V. in its latest version, R2. many new features have been introduced that make it a hit with those looking to consolidate they aging farm of servers they have to support.

Here are some resources you may want to look into.

Consolidate & virtualize

http://www.microsoft.com/everybodysbusiness/en/us/projects/consolidate-virtualize.aspx

Move Over VMWare, Here Comes HyperV

http://www.sysmannews.com/(S(np33wjzv0vnhrvnyr5fyn0ay))/SearchResult/32460

http://www.perftuning.com/pdf/Oracle%2010g%20on%20Hyper-V%202008%20Paper.pdf

Citrix XenServer

Enterprise-class. Cloud-proven. Free

http://www.citrix.com/English/ps2/products/feature.asp?contentID=1686939

Citrix. Enabling the Journey to the Cloud!

http://www.vmware.com/

And for more fun, here is a project to get your hands wet with virtualization. Setup the FREE Vmware server and run MacOSX from your PC.

http://wiki.osx86project.org/wiki/index.php/Vmware_how_to

Here are some examples of how a typical call center would consolidate the farm.

Without Virtualization.

Servers:

* Domain Controller

* Terminal Server

* Database Server

* CRM/WebServer

With Virtualization:

* Single Dell Poweredge 2900 with 16gb ram, Raid 10, or Raid 50

– 4 Virtual Servers which were created with Citrix XenConvert ( a physical to Virtual tool to capture the existing environment and convert the server to a virtual hard disk.)

see: http://www.citrix.com/English/ss/downloads/details.asp?downloadId=1857892&productId=683148 for more information on XenConvert.

I have used this tool with great success with VMWARE, XEN, and Hyper-V platforms.

Well, i hope you enjoyed this post. Have a Great new year!

Michael Crabtree

CTO – Genesis Communications