Servers and virtualization
Windows and Linux servers, virtual machines, and consolidating old hardware onto one box.
Three old servers each doing one job cost more in power, space and attention than one new machine running all three as virtual guests. A virtual machine also comes back from a backup in minutes, while a physical one takes days to rebuild.
When an old server becomes a risk
A familiar picture in smaller companies: a server about ten years old running the accounting software, the shared folders and the domain. That version of Windows Server no longer gets security patches, the disks are the originals, and nobody knows exactly what is installed on it. While it runs, nobody touches it. When it stops, the business stops with it.
Failure is not the only problem. An unpatched system is open to attacks that have been known for years, and old hardware is hard to repair because the parts are no longer made. A spare disk with the same interface and size can be hard to find.
How we approach the move
First we list what the server actually does: services, scheduled tasks, shared folders, licences and the programs that depend on it. That list is almost always longer than anyone expects.
- A Proxmox VE or Hyper-V hypervisor, with disks in RAID and ECC memory
- Each role in its own virtual machine: the domain kept apart from applications, applications apart from files
- Moving the existing system into a virtual machine (P2V) when a program cannot be reinstalled
- A snapshot before every significant change, so an update that goes wrong can be rolled back
We plan the move so the old server stays running until every role has been checked on the new one.
What you end up with
One machine with clearly separated virtual machines, documentation listing the roles and the start up order, passwords in a password manager rather than on paper, and monitoring that warns when a disk starts reporting errors or space is running out. Whole machine backups go to a separate device, so after a failure a machine can be brought up on spare hardware.
For some companies the right answer is not a new server but moving part of the services to the cloud. If that is the case, the assessment says so.
Common questions
Proxmox or Hyper-V?
If you already have Windows Server licences and people used to Microsoft tools, Hyper-V is the natural choice. Proxmox has no licence cost for the hypervisor itself and runs Linux and Windows guests well, with a subscription paid for support and the stable update repository.
Will work stop during the move?
We plan the move outside working hours, and the old server stays as a fallback until the new one has been checked. You get the plan with the order of steps in advance.
How much does a new virtualized server cost?
It depends on the number of virtual machines, the memory, the disks and the licences needed. A quote follows once we have listed what the current server does.