Kingston Communications Virtualisation Platforms

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1 Kingston Communications Virtualisation Platforms The KC Managed Server is architected to provide a dedicated server based on the hugely successful VMWare platform. By using the Enterprise version of VMware ESX 3.5 the KC Managed Server provides higher availability and better upgrade flexibility than a traditional dedicated server without losing any of the benefits that a traditional dedicated server provides. Managed Server Architecture Overview

2 Managed Server benefits Fully monitored server (CPU, Disk, Network..) Server management of operating system High availability. In the unlikely event of a hardware failure the Managed Server is immediately started up on another physical host in the farm. The farm operates in an N+1 mode so that there will be no deterioration in performance following the failover. There is no downtime waiting for hardware to be fixed. Instantaneous upgrades of CPU and RAM should a more powerful server be required Disk space can be increased as required. Additional servers can be created within a very short time as demand requires. Direct 100Mbps connection onto our tier-1 backbone in one of our hosting centres World class hosting centre with full environmental controls Unlimited routed IP addresses for your server 24 hour support hotline manned by experienced engineers. 24 hour network monitoring and fault detection Backups included as part of the service

3 VMWare Platforms The KC Managed Server is based on the hugely successful VMWare platform running on IBM X Series server hardware. VMWare is a Virtualisation system - Virtualisation is an abstraction layer that decouples the physical hardware from the operating system to deliver greater IT resource utilisation and flexibility. VMWare runs as an application on a proprietary operating system, and VMWare instances or Managed Servers can run either a Windows 2003 server or Linux operating system. Virtualisation allows multiple virtual machines, with heterogeneous operating systems to run in isolation, side-by-side on the same physical machine. Each virtual machine has its own set of virtual hardware (e.g., RAM, CPU, NIC, etc.) upon which an operating system and applications are loaded. The operating system sees a consistent, normalised set of hardware regardless of the actual physical hardware components. Virtual machines are encapsulated into files, making it possible to rapidly save, copy and provision a virtual machine. Full systems (fully configured applications, operating systems, BIOS and virtual hardware) can be moved automatically within seconds, from one physical server to another for zero-downtime maintenance and continuous workload consolidation. for more info see VMware is one of the world s fastest growing $100 million+ software companies VMware is relied upon by more than 80 percent of the FORTUNE 100 and leading organisations worldwide

4 Benefits of Virtualisation Partitioning Multiple applications and operating systems can be supported within a single physical system Servers can be consolidated into virtual machines on either a scale-up or scale-out architecture Computing resources are treated as a uniform pool to be allocated to virtual machines in a controlled manner Isolation Virtual machines are completely isolated from the host machine and other virtual machines. If a virtual machine crashes, all others are unaffected Data does not leak across virtual machines and applications can only communicate over configured network connections Encapsulation Complete virtual machine environment is saved as a single file; easy to back up, move and copy Standardised virtualised hardware is presented to the application - guaranteeing compatibility

5 Storage The KC Server utilises the Storage Area Network (SAN). NetApp is a leading full-line provider of unified enterprise storage solutions that deliver simplified data management, flexible and scalable storage infrastructure, comprehensive data protection, and reliable data access. Founded on a vision of providing simple solutions to complex businesss problems, NetApp has established itself as a leader and innovator in the storage industry through a passionate commitment to simplicity, innovation, and teamwork. The KC SAN consistss of a NetApp device for primary storage which is housed in KC s Global Switch data-centre facility and a NetApp device for backup and resilience which is housed in KC s Reading data centre. Server images are stored on the SAN, so all of the client operating system and data is stored as a single image file (per Managed Server). In the event of a hardware failure on the host hardware machine, a new hardware instance can simply be pointed at the Managed Server image on the SAN. The SAN itself is resilient due to the dual controller and dual switch configuration. All Managed Server images are replicated to KC s backup SAN unit at the secondary data centre in Reading. Benefits of SAN Storage: Higher performance disks Higher MTBF (Mean Time Before Failure) than traditional disks Upgradeable on the fly in GB increments Options to snapshot or mirror data for greater resilience Faster recovery from hardware failure

6 Backup KC provides a baseline data backup facility using IBM Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM), this backup is intended primarily to guard against data corruption/loss caused by hardware fault or security breach. Although it is available to the customer for protection against application fault or for archival use we would recommend customers take advantage of our enhanced backup offerings if protection of this type is required. The client (agent) software is installed on the dedicated server and compresses the backup data before it is tunnelled within MPLS across the KC core network to the nominated backup server. This is a fully secure connection. All backups are compressed on the shared backup platform. Generally a dedicated network interface card is used which is connected to a private, non-routable network solely for backup. Optional data encryption can be switched on for an additional charge but this does add extra load to the CPU on the dedicated server when the backup is running. All data backups are stored off site in an independent location. This ensures that the backup data is not stored in the same data centre as the environment that is being backed up.