Appendix B Planning a Virtualization Strategy for Exchange Server 2010

Overview Hyper-V Overview High Availability Options with Hyper-V Planning a Virtualization Strategy for Exchange Server 2010

Lesson 1: Hyper-V Overview What Is Hyper-V? Requirements and Limits for Hyper-V Hosts Planning for Disks and Storage Virtual Machine Overview Virtual Disk Configuration Options Identifying Server Virtualization Candidates Using Virtual Machine Manager to Manage Virtual Environments

What Is Hyper-V? Applications Windows Server 2003, 2008 Windows Kernel VSC VMBus “Designed for Windows” Server Hardware Windows hypervisor Supported Linux Distributions Linux VSC Child Partitions OSISV / IHV / OEMMicrosoft Hyper-V User Mode Kernel Mode Ring -1 Windows Server 2008 Windows Kernel VMBus Parent Partition VM Services WMI Provider VM Worker Processes Applications Microsoft / Citrix Provided by VS P IHV Drivers Non-Hypervisor Aware OS Emulation Hyper-V is a hypervisor-based virtualization technology

Requirements and Limits for Hyper-V Hosts ComponentDescription Logical processors64 Virtual processors per logical processor8 Virtual machines per server384 running virtual machines Memory1 terabyte StorageNo limits imposed by Hyper-V Physical network adaptersNo limits imposed by Hyper-V

Planning for Disks and Storage Hyper-V host computers can use: Directly attached storage Storage Area Networks Virtual machines require storage for: Virtual hard disk files Snapshots Failover clustering Application data files

Virtual Machine Overview Virtual machines components include: Virtual processors Memory Network adapters Virtual disks ComponentDescription Virtual processors4 Memory64 GB Virtual IDE disks4 Virtual SCSI disks256 Virtual hard disk capacity 2,040 GB Snapshots50 Virtual network adapters 12 Virtual machine components

Virtual Disk Configuration Options Storage controller types: IDE Required for the boot and system volume Maximum of two controllers with two drives per controller SCSI Maximum of four SCSI controllers with 256 drives Slightly better performance Virtual disk types: Dynamically expanding Fixed-size Differencing Pass-through

Identifying Server Virtualization Candidates When identifying server workloads to virtualize, consider: Hardware requirements Compatibility Supportability Licensing

Using Virtual Machine Manager to Manage Virtual Environments Virtual Machine Manager is used to: Manage virtual machines running on different host platforms Convert physical and virtual machines to Hyper-V virtual machines Intelligently manage virtual machine placement Enable self-service management of virtual machines Enable storage of virtual machine components in a library Integrate with System Center Operations Manager 2007 to manage virtual machines and hosts

Lesson 2: High Availability Options with Hyper-V Options for Providing High Availability for Virtualization How Network Load Balancing Works What Is a Failover Cluster? Failover Cluster Functionality in Windows Server 2008 R2 Requirements for Failover Clustering in Hyper-V The Process for Implementing Hyper-V and Failover Clustering

Options for Providing High Availability for Virtualization High availability optionsDescription Host clustering Virtual machines are highly available Does not require virtual machine operating system or application to be cluster aware Guest clustering Virtual machines are failover cluster nodes Virtual machine applications must be cluster-aware Requires iSCSI for shared storage connections Network load balancing (NLB) Virtual machines are NLB cluster nodes Use for Web-based applications

How Network Load Balancing Works Client network Hyper-V Host 1Hyper-V Host 2 NLB application A dedicated network connects the NLB cluster nodes Virtual Machine Node 1 Virtual Machine Node 2

What Is a Failover Cluster?

Failover Cluster Functionality in Windows Server 2008 R2 Clustered Shared Volumes Live migration Processor compatibility mode Windows PowerShell cmdlets for failover clusters Additional tests in cluster validation

Requirements for Failover Clustering in Hyper-V Hardware requirements for cluster nodes and storage Software requirements for cluster nodes Network infrastructure requirements

The Process for Implementing Hyper-V and Failover Clustering Validate the cluster configuration Install the Hyper-V and failover clustering features Configure shared storage Create the cluster Install and configure Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R Create a virtual machine on one of the cluster nodes 6 6 Make the virtual machine highly available 7 7

Lesson 3: Planning a Virtualization Strategy for Exchange Server 2010 Exchange Server 2010 Virtualization Support Planning Hyper-V Hosts Guidelines for Planning Exchange Server 2010 Virtual Machines Designing Virtualization for Client Access Servers Designing Virtualization for Transport Servers Design Virtualization for Mailbox Servers

Exchange Server 2010 Virtualization Support CategoryRequirement Virtualization host Hyper-V or supported hypervisor- based platform Dedicated as a virtualization host Virtual machines Unified Messaging role not supported Total processor limitations Storage Supported – Fixed Disk, SCSI pass-through disks, iSCSI- attached disks Not supported – Dynamically expanding disks, differencing disks, snapshots

Planning Hyper-V Hosts When planning Hyper-V hosts: Simplify and standardize the host platform Consider using the Server Core installation option Automate and standardize administration of the virtual server environment Separate the administration of the host computers and virtual machines Reserve at least one GB of RAM for the host Dedicate a network adaptor for management and a network adapter for live migration Configure separate LUNs for the host operating system, the virtual machine operating system, and data storage Use Windows Server 2008 R2 for failover clustering

Guidelines for Planning Exchange Server 2010 Virtual Machines When designing virtual machines for Exchange Server: Use standard server-sizing rules Configure appropriate storage Do not use virtual machine snapshots Configure adequate CPU resources Consider other options for ensuring physical server utilization Assign virtual machines running different Exchange Server roles to each host computer

Designing Virtualization for Client Access Servers When designing virtual machines for Client Access servers: Consider using NLB for high availability and load balancing Distribute virtual machines in an NLB cluster across hosts Plan a standard hardware configuration Deploy three Client Access servers for each Mailbox server Configure required storage

Designing Virtualization for Transport Servers When designing virtual machines for Transport servers: Use built-in Hub Transport server redundancy Plan a standard hardware configuration Deploy one Hub Transport server for each Mailbox server Configure required storage

Design Virtualization for Mailbox Servers When designing virtual machines for Mailbox Servers: Do not combine host clustering and DAGs Consider using DAGs for high availability Assign members of the same DAG to different hosts Consider performance implications Plan for storage Plan a standard hardware configuration

Module Review and Takeaways Review Questions Real-world Issues and Scenarios Best Practices Tools