Is reducing or controlling the high cost of the power to run and cool computer hardware is a top priority for your organization? Are you considering server virtualization solutions to reduce your server footprint and the associated power and cooling costs?
Because the virtualization of Microsoft Exchange servers rarely results in a reduction of physical processors, there is some question as to whether there is significant hardware, power, cooling, or space savings from virtualizing correctly-sized Exchange Server 2007 server roles. The answer to this question can be found in a new White Paper we just released about a study that was done internally, entitled "Comparing the Power Utilization of Native and Virtual Exchange Environments." This study compared the power utilization of native and virtual Exchange server environments in a scenario in which the number of physical servers was reduced from eight to two, but the total number of logical processors and the amount of memory remained the same. It examined power utilization of native and virtual Exchange 2007 environments in a scenario where physical servers were reduced from 8 to 2 but the total number of logical processors remained constant at 32. There was no processor core consolidation, and storage power utilization was not included. In this scenario, there was a 50 percent reduction in server power utilization and a projected savings of 8,582 kWh/year.
For more details about the study and its conclusions, check out the White Paper, "Comparing the Power Utilization of Native and Virtual Exchange Environments."
