Virtualization projects typically start with test and development servers and move up the food chain to production servers. The first group of these virtualized servers often includes utility applications that don’t draw a lot of resources but also won’t significantly impact the business if they go down. After these are virtualized, the next phase involves applications that are important or even critical to the operation of the business. At this point, many virtualization projects stall because of the risks involved.

Change-based replication solutions can be set up to create a second copy of the server being virtualized, one that IT can use to fail over operations from the source should a problem occur. This “back button” use case can reduce the risk commonly associated with virtualizing business-important applications. When the virtualized primary server has proven to be stable, the target server can be redeployed, or left running to provide a DR capability.

Risk mitigation is a key consideration of any IT implementation. Change-based replication and failover solutions can provide a sense of security for IT managers who are planning a server virtualization project — and for the VARs who are going to run that project.

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But, even with image-based backups, returning applications to operational status requires several steps. First, data must be restored from the backup storage area, where it’s typically in a format proprietary to the backup software. This restore process involves converting the data into its original file format and physically copying it back to the primary storage area. This recovery transfer step can be significant with large files, and recovery transfer time can adversely impact the RTO. Another issue is restoring individual data objects specific to the application, like email messages. Most data backup products require either agents be installed on the application or a special backup process be run to support this granular restore. Message- or mailbox-level restores, as an example, often required a more complex backup process than would restoring the entire email data store.

New technologies in image-based backup solutions now enable hosts to run VMs directly from the backup area, without first restoring these files to primary storage. By allowing a VMDK file to be accessed and run while it’s still a “backup file” eliminates the entire recovery transfer step and shortens the time to data significantly. Another feature of these new image backup solutions is recovering application-specific data objects without agents or special backup steps.

The ability to run VMs from the backup area also enables another key improvement to image-based backups: recovery verification. These solutions can, as part of the backup process, run a recovery verification step, to make sure the VM can be restarted. Instead of simply confirming that data can be returned in one piece, this process can assure that the application, or the entire application stack across several VMs, can be recovered.

For storage VARs, server virtualization is a fact of their customers’ lives. And, like their physical server predecessors, the topic of backing up virtual machines comes up often. For customers already using image-based backup solutions, features like backup verification and in-place recovery of VMs can support some compelling discussions. For those still using traditional backup solutions, this may be the tipping point to making the switch to image backups.

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Basically, virtualizing storage in this environment just makes sense — and enables a lot of the benefits that server virtualization can offer. However, care must be taken to deal with the vulnerabilities of consolidating storage in a virtual environment. “If one ESX server goes down, you only lose the VMs on that box, and you can move them to another ESX host and you’re back up and running. When a shared array goes down, you can lose all the VMs connected to it,” said Brock Bruner, VMware solution architect for Denver-based integrator Zunesis. “Since these VMs effectively boot from shared storage, they’re down until the array is back up.”

According to Jeff Hill, storage architect at Zunesis, “Virtualizing the storage as well as the servers gives you more resiliency and protection on both sides of the equation. An integrator can help a customer weigh all of the variables — the platform’s availability and performance, balanced against customer expectations and budgetary constraints. A strategy that may include different service levels can help a customer meet the needs of their internal customers while staying within their budget.”

For a VAR, a server virtualization project can be a good opportunity to talk about potential risks. As we discussed in a previous post about the IT compass, there are certain topics that IT is always on the lookout for, like risk reduction. So, even if you didn’t do the server virtualization project in the first place, you may find that companies are still interested in hearing about how the right virtualized storage solution can help them.

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That’s your cue. As the options increase, so does your customer’s need for your services. As a VAR, you now have more flexibility in designing a storage infrastructure and, just as importantly, you also have customers who need your help in making this protocol decision. Factors such as throughput requirements, the number of virtual machines (current and planned), knowledge levels of IT personnel, legacy storage hardware, budget, expected data set growth, etc., can help you design the storage system that will best meet their needs. 

For some performance-driven customers, it could be Fibre Channel. For those without budget (know any?), iSCSI will be the only option — although there are a lot of vendors in this space to choose from. For many, a NAS or hybrid, multiprotocol solution is best. The point is, you’re in your element researching specs for multiple available technologies, designing systems that provide a range of options, and presenting the best solution to your customer. 

Traditionally, storage manufacturers have a “favorite” storage networking technology, (or at least one they push). NAS vendors typically favor NFS, although many have a multiprotocol option with Fibre Channel and/or iSCSI. The traditional block storage vendors (the “big iron”) would like you to recommend Fibre Channel, but most have a NAS head and/or an IP block (iSCSI) option as well. Finally, the IP SAN vendors push iSCSI almost exclusively. But you, as the trusted storage advisor, can take the vendor-neutral high road, present the best solution and win a customer.

One product that’s been a great door opener is VMware. Typical for game-changers like this, everyone wants to see it. As a VAR you can ride through the door of many a new prospect company on the coattails of a new product like VMware. But, what if you don’t sell VMware? Or, what if the prospect already has a server virtualization product in place?

Show them storage virtualization

Storage virtualization can bring some of the same benefits that server virtualization brings: better utilization, ease of management, simpler upgrades, higher availability and cost savings with commodity hardware. In the article “Virtual Storage Infrastructure,” we explain the details for this natural next step for customers who have already implemented server virtualization but aren’t candidates for a traditional SAN.

It’s like selling a follow-on product to an existing customer; they already understand the concept and its benefits. They just need someone to bring it through the door.

Next time, we’ll talk more about the options available in virtual storage and how to leverage those as a storage VAR.

Akorri, Tek-Tools and Vizioncore – which I met with last week at VMworld — are examples of some of the companies offering solutions to the problems of monitoring and optimizing resources in a virtual environment. They can help users understand storage utilization as well as server utilization, to minimize capital and operating expenses. For VARs that know virtualization, products like these are attractive for several reasons.

1. There’s a target-rich environment for these products. You can approach any company with a virtualized environment (even if you didn’t sell it) and typically get some interest, since many virtualized environments are suboptimized, from a resource perspective.

2. The sales process for monitoring and management products gives you an insight into a company’s environment, which can identify where their problems are — and where other opportunities are.

3. Consultation-based engagements like these are profitable and, compared with a typical hardware sale, can leave you with a customer who really understands your value.

The sales process for these types of products typically involves an on-site demo installation, which can be left running for the prospect to use — and fall in love with. This “puppy dog close” can be very effective. And as I mentioned above, the entire process can give you real insight into other problems they have, which you may able to address, if they decide not to keep the puppy.

Pivot3

Pivot3’s Cloudbank is a 12-drive, 2U appliance that includes an embedded server. Up to 12 appliances can be connected via iSCSI into a grid to provide more than 100 TB of usable capacity in a RAID 6e configuration. (RAID 6e is Pivot3’s enhanced version of RAID 6, protecting against three simultaneous disk failures.)

With no dedicated processor nodes, this scalable SAN is ideal for “storage-centric” applications, like video surveillance and other image-related uses. This is a market the company has done very well in.

With the embedded server on each node, these storage appliances provide an interesting solution for virtual environments, since ESX can be loaded onto the storage hardware, creating a standalone SAN with compute power built in. External servers can also access this SAN to consolidate existing storage.

Channel angle

This is a storage solution that you can sell into a VMware implementation and have an answer to keep server vendors out of the deal, since servers are built into the storage hardware. If you’re tired of fighting with HP or Dell in every storage opportunity, this should be a welcome detail. Also, this product has a high “gee-whiz” factor, which drives up interest and can get you more appointments.

Pivot3 has been focused on the video surveillance market but is now looking for storage VARs who know how to take innovation into the mainstream IT marketplace.

In my next blog post, I’ll talk about another product you might want to look into.