Storage virtualization provider DataCore Software is now deploying its SANmelody system in conjunction with the second release of Microsoft Windows Server 2008, working in clustered Hyper-V systems.
The news here is that a Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V cluster now has the ability to “live-migrate” the virtual machines, meaning two cluster nodes have read/write access to the disk at the same time. This wasn’t possible in the first release.
Running on this infrastructure, there are four VMs that can live-migrate between the two hosts at any time. Here’s a closer look at this.
The time and money savings of this feature are potentially significant. Live migration elicited a lot of interest recently when DataCore showcased its storage virtualization software at Microsoft’s TechEd Europe show in Berlin.
“What this DataCore-Hyper-V setup does is to minimize or even eliminate downtime, when we need to make system changes,” said Jack Weisberg, IT director of an early adopter, the New York law firm of McNamee, Lochner, Titus & Williams. “So far this system is working very nicely. Plus, everything is redundant. We have redundant storage with DataCore. And we have redundancy built into the VM system.”
When making the purchasing decision to replace some legacy hardware and software, Weisberg said it boiled down to DataCore’s SANmelody versus an HP/LeftHand Networks system.
“In comparing both systems, we found both to be strong in terms of their capability of avoiding single points of failure,” Weisberg said. “But I really like not being tied to specific hardware — something DataCore enables. It was very important for us not to get locked into older platforms, when there is newer hardware available on the market that we could use with SANmelody.”
Using DataCore, the storage solution provider, P&J Computers, was able to use its preferred hardware of choice — in this case, enterprise-class 6GB SAS drives. DataCore enabled administrators to add a couple of 10GB NICs (network interface cards) in these servers at a very low cost.
So, there’s some real-world decision making at work. Is that something you’re looking at for 2010?