Friday, June 24, 2011

Is Virtualization the Answer?

As many of you know, I spend a lot of time hassling with the many machines on my network.  It has long passed the point of me being a full-time network administrator just to manage my home network.  I have a web server, a mail server, a home theater media server, a primary development desktop, two additional desktops in the bedrooms, two portable PCs, two additional floating desktops, and all that doesn't even take into account the mobile devices, media extenders, access points, and spaghetti nightmare of network line that has to be maintained.  That's 10 PCs, plus extra devices.

It's far too much.  Is this what the connected house of tomorrow will become?  No, there has to be a better answer.  And there is definitely a way to minimize the extraneous hardware.  Enter virtualization.

Virtualized machines are rapidly gaining in popularity and practicality, and while I've been tinkering with them over the past few years, I've only just truly realized the full effects of utilizing the technology.  When my primary development/gaming PC failed a few months ago, I spent a lot of time assessing my options.  I went without until I could put a practical plan in place.  And the result surprised me.

Typically, I like to have the power of my primary machine within arm's reach, but in this case, it just wasn't worth the hassle anymore.  My recent lifestyle push toward minimalization steered me toward condensing functionality.

The overhead up front was rather large (compared to what I normally invest in a machine).  I built an AMD 6-core PC with 8 GB RAM (which I will expand later) and installed Windows 7 64-bit so that it could be used as the home theater centerpiece.  Here's where the magic happens: using Oracle VirtualBox, I created virtual machines that would take over the duties of other  machines throughout the network.

I have one dedicated mail server, one web server, and a third (new) virtual machine that is a dedicated remote access interface.  It has only a minimal compliment of software, but is locked down tight so as to be the only interface between my home network and the outside world.  I also have this new server pulling double duty as both the entertainment centerpiece (HTPC) and primary gaming machine, figuring that the most gaming we do is in the living room (alongside the other entertainment devices, such as the XBox).

Now, using a separate login, I can RDP into that main machine from another desktop and utilize the processing power to handle all my development needs, and can do so without interfering with the people watching a recorded show on the media center downstairs.

I've condensed 4 machines into 1, and under typical operation, the CPU utilization of this new machine is well under 10%.  It seems to me that I have more than enough room to handle the majority of my computing needs in this one box.  Granted, a virtual machine still has administrative needs, but it certainly cuts down on the hardware maintenance, and eliminates a lot of the network requirements as well.  It seems to me that if the few people in the house would use portable PCs exclusively, my unpaid job here would be much easier.

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