What are the ad­vant­ages of vir­tu­al­isa­tion?

The steady advance of di­git­al­isa­tion and in­creas­ing demands on IT in­fra­struc­ture have made ef­fi­ciency a deciding factor in the success of any business. Server vir­tu­al­isa­tion is a ground­break­ing tech­no­logy that can help companies make optimal use of their IT resources and reduce costs. But many companies are still hesitant to implement it. In this article, we’ll lay out 10 ad­vant­ages of vir­tu­al­isa­tion.

What is server vir­tu­al­isa­tion?

Server vir­tu­al­isa­tion is a tech­no­logy that enables you to run several separate virtual servers on a single physical hardware platform. In the past, each ap­plic­a­tion required its own physical server, which led to an in­ef­fi­cient use of resources. Vir­tu­al­isa­tion trans­forms those physical servers into virtual machines (VMs) that can each run their own operating system and ap­plic­a­tions but share physical hardware. That kind of virtual isolation enables a more flexible use of resources and more efficient use of hardware.

You can read about the different kinds of vir­tu­al­isa­tion and their pros and cons in our article ‘What is vir­tu­al­isa­tion?’. Below we’ll discuss 10 ad­vant­ages of vir­tu­al­isa­tion to il­lus­trate how companies can benefit from the tech­no­logy.

How server vir­tu­al­isa­tion benefits busi­nesses

Energy savings

Server vir­tu­al­isa­tion enables companies to save energy and reduce operating costs by con­sol­id­at­ing more servers on less hardware. Fewer servers means less energy used for cooling, lighting and main­ten­ance. Ad­di­tion­ally, resources like CPU, RAM and storage can be spread out dy­nam­ic­ally among virtual machines (VMs) using hy­per­visors. That helps with more optimal use of resources and less use of power.

Smaller data centres

Reducing physical server in­fra­struc­ture not only lowers energy costs but also means smaller data centers. So one advantage of vir­tu­al­isa­tion is a sig­ni­fic­ant reduction in the amount of physical space your company needs, since you can run the same amount of ap­plic­a­tions and services on fewer physical servers. That means you can make better use of space and use your existing data centres more ef­fi­ciently or even switch to smaller ones. Having smaller data centres can help you optimise your op­er­a­tions and make them more flexible. Simpler, more efficient in­fra­struc­ture enables you to launch services and ap­plic­a­tions more quickly, which increases the speed of in­nov­a­tion and gives you a com­pet­it­ive edge.

Space for your own lab

Another advantage of vir­tu­al­isa­tion is the chance to set up your own test centre, without having to acquire more physical hardware. You can use VMs on existing servers to create test and de­vel­op­ment en­vir­on­ments at no ad­di­tion­al cost. That allows you to test ap­plic­a­tions, operating systems and con­fig­ur­a­tions in an isolated virtual en­vir­on­ment.

Faster server pro­vi­sion­ing

Virtual servers can be pro­vi­sioned sig­ni­fic­antly faster than physical servers. In just a few minutes, you can create and configure new virtual machines, which increases the agility and re­spons­ive­ness of your IT op­er­a­tions.

Reduced vendor lock in for hardware

Vir­tu­al­isa­tion reduces your de­pend­ence on certain hardware providers, which in turn reduces vendor lock in for hardware. That gives your company more flex­ib­il­ity in its choice of hardware and enables you to select the com­pon­ents that best suit your needs. You can then reduce costs, compare competing offers and choose the hardware that’s the best fit for your spe­cific­a­tions, without being tied to a long-term contract with a single supplier.

Another big advantage of vir­tu­al­isa­tion is the flex­ib­il­ity that your company gains from less vendor lock in, which reduces costs and keeps you open to changing business con­di­tions.

Increased avail­ab­il­ity

The ability to quickly migrate virtual machines between physical hosts can minimise downtime due to hardware failures. This increases the avail­ab­il­ity of ap­plic­a­tions and services. Clus­ter­ing tech­no­lo­gies can be used to replicate virtual machines on several physical servers, enabling automatic recovery on another available host in the event of a hardware failure.

Live migration tech­no­lo­gies make it possible to move VMs from one physical host to another without in­ter­rup­tion, so you can run main­ten­ance or real­loc­ate resources without impacting avail­ab­il­ity. Automated mon­it­or­ing and fault detection with vir­tu­al­isa­tion man­age­ment tools help you to identify and resolve potential problems early and thus avoid downtime. Ad­di­tion­al ad­vant­ages of vir­tu­al­isa­tion include an increase in pro­ductiv­ity, higher customer sat­is­fac­tion and cost savings.

Virtual disaster recovery

There are also a number of benefits of server vir­tu­al­isa­tion related to virtual disaster recovery. Your company can convert its physical servers into VMs and replicate them on backup servers, which comes with shorter recovery time than tra­di­tion­al methods. This solution is also more cost effective, as it doesn’t require expensive backup hardware and uses existing vir­tu­al­isa­tion en­vir­on­ments.

Ad­di­tion­ally, auto­mat­ing disaster recovery processes enables faster reactions to emer­gen­cies and minimises human error. The flex­ib­il­ity and scalab­il­ity of virtual disaster recovery allows you to adapt your disaster recovery strategy to changing needs and ensure business con­tinu­ity. Regular testing and val­id­a­tion will ensure that your recovery processes are working ef­fect­ively.

Isolated ap­plic­a­tions

Providing a separate virtual en­vir­on­ment for each ap­plic­a­tion allows your company to use resources like CPU, RAM and storage more ef­fi­ciently. It also ensures that each ap­plic­a­tion has enough resources, without impacting other ap­plic­a­tions. Isolated en­vir­on­ments increase security by reducing the risk of data leaks. In addition, they simplify the man­age­ment and main­ten­ance for ap­plic­a­tions, as updates and con­fig­ur­a­tion changes can be made in isolated en­vir­on­ments without affecting other ap­plic­a­tions.

Increased longevity for older ap­plic­a­tions

Vir­tu­al­isa­tion can extend the life of older ap­plic­a­tions by providing an en­vir­on­ment that’s separate from physical hardware. That means you can keep using older ap­plic­a­tions once their un­der­ly­ing hardware is outdated or no longer supported. You can run older ap­plic­a­tions on modern servers or in the cloud, which improves the com­pat­ib­il­ity and avail­ab­il­ity of older software. That reduces the costs that come with migration to new platforms and the de­vel­op­ment of new ap­plic­a­tions.

In­teg­ra­tion in the cloud

The in­teg­ra­tion of server vir­tu­al­isa­tion and cloud tech­no­lo­gies offers your company flexible, high-per­form­ing in­fra­struc­ture by seam­lessly in­teg­rat­ing vir­tu­al­isa­tion en­vir­on­ments in the cloud – re­gard­less of whether that’s a public cloud, hybrid cloud or private cloud. Using the cloud allows you to quickly scale resources without investing in expensive hardware. The cloud offers highly available and flexible in­fra­struc­ture that stores ap­plic­a­tions and data securely.

Summary

The biggest ad­vant­ages of vir­tu­al­isa­tion include increased scalab­il­ity, agility, cost ef­fi­ciency and security. Using flexible and highly available in­fra­struc­ture can help your company increase its com­pet­it­ive­ness, drive in­nov­a­tion and offer excellent service to customers.