Before considering replacing servers you should be aware of the technologies now widely used within schools. Server consolidation is a process where the power of modern server hardware is fully utilised to do the work of several traditional physical servers.

More and more schools are starting to look at server consolidation as a way of reducing cost, through hardware and energy savings. Since 2008, Computer Talk have been using Microsoft’s virtualisation solution Hyper-V which has been included as part of the Windows Server operating system, and is therefore a cost-effective yet powerful solution.The consolidation of existing servers or a new virtualized server environment provides flexible and dynamic server systems which can change with your requirements, offer huge savings in power and licensing costs and provide access to high availability solutions for essential services.

The concept of Server Consolidation...
The diagram below shows how a system which would normally have 12 physical servers can be reduced to only two powerful hosts thereby reducing your green footprint and simplifying your system. This will make the most of the power inherent in new server technology which would otherwise go to waste.

The SAN at the bottom is a Storage Area Network which simply means that instead of having your systems storage capacity locked in to each individual server you can pool it together and so allocate space wherever it is required. Such systems also give you access to the use of Disaster Recovery and Data Backup options as opposed to simply backing up data.

The benefits of Virtualization for schools include:

• Reduce capital hardware costs
• Reduce licensing costs
• Reduce power consumption and heat output
• Gain access to Disaster Recovery options
• Access flexibility of resources to meet changing needs
• Access high availability solutions
• Improve ease of server management