This application report describes how one IT organization consolidated 1,100 rack mount servers with virtualized blade servers.

1. Where IT perceptions are reality
Application Report
Migrating from Discrete
to Virtual Servers
Featuring
Development & QA Lab
OneConnect
HP ProLiant BL490c G7 Servers
Virtual Connect Flex-10
ESXi 5.0
Document # APP2012001 v10 August, 2012
Copyright 2012© IT Brand Pulse. All rights reserved.

2. About
Company Overview
Vonage (NYSE: VG) is a leading provider of communications services
connecting individuals through broadband devices worldwide. With
approximately 2.4 million subscribers, Vonage maintains and operates a robust, high-quality, VoIP network that supports over six billion communications per year. Through portable land-line phone replacement and mobile calling applications, Vonage World and
Vonage World Mobile plans offer unlimited calling to more than 60
countries for one low monthly rate. Vonage's service is sold on the
web to customers in the U.S. (www.vonage.com), Canada
(www.vonage.ca) and the United Kingdom (www.vonage.co.uk), and
through regional and national retailers.
Vonage is one of the largest VoIP providers
Development & QA Lab
and an industry pioneer. Its name is a play on
their motto "Voice-Over-Net-AGE.”
Located at corporate headquarters in Holmdel, New Jersey, is the Vonage Development & QA Lab. It’s here
that Vonage new technology and products are evaluated before they can enter a production environment.
The Development & QA Lab also is where Vonage IT architects and engineers develop and certify the standard hardware and software images which will be used in production systems ranging from front-end web
servers to back-end database servers.
Migrating from Discrete to Virtualized Data Center
Taking advantage of technologies which will allow the company to
consolidate infrastructure, reduce costs, and speed new server deployments, the Vonage data center in Holmdel is migrating from a
mostly non-virtualized “discrete” environment, to a virtualized data center. This installation features approximately 40 data center
cabinets with 1,100 rack-mount servers — each dedicated to specific applications. The power-hungry rack servers are connected to
data center LANs and SANs by over 3,000 cables; deploying a new
server takes about 2 weeks from the time a user makes a request.
Goals
Production servers in Holmdel, New Jersey
host a range of business-critical applications
ranging from front-end web servers to backend database servers.
Reduce the space, power, cooling, and cabling needed by 1,100 rackmount servers. Shorten the time to deploy new application servers.
Document # APP2012001 v10, August, 2012
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3. Key Technologies
The Vonage migration from discrete data center to virtualized data center involves
many new technologies, products, and processes. Blade servers, server virtualization and network virtualization stand out as technologies which are key to slashing
costs, while maintaining application performance and availability.
Blade Servers
Vonage is deploying HP ProLiant BL490c G7 blade servers to perform the same function as rack servers, but with far less floor space, power, cooling, and cables. By
sharing resources through a single enclosure, blade servers will also eliminate a
great deal of management complexity and overlap.
A fully populated HP blade
system includes 16 server
blades, interconnected by a
single backplane, to LAN and
SAN switch fabrics embedded
in the chassis.
Server Virtualization
A typical application server utilizes only 1% to 5% of available CPU. Server virtualization allows Vonage to fully utilize the compute power of each physical blade server by running multiple virtual machines (VMs) and applications. The result is another level of massive consolidation and cost savings.
Network Virtualization
To accommodate the proliferation of VMs, the HP BladeSystems feature virtual networking capabilities which
allow server admins to configure unique virtual networks for each VM. Embedded on G7 servers used by
Vonage are dual-port integrated HP Virtual Connect 10Gb FlexFabric Adapters, which are based on Emulex
OneConnect® technology. A single HP 10Gb FlexFabric Adapter port can be configured as 4 FlexNICs, with an
option to configure one as a FlexHBA for either FC or iSCSI storage connectivity. Each FlexNIC or FlexHBA can
be configured with its own set of network policies tailored to the needs of specific VMs and applications.
One or two dual-port 10Gb HP Virtual Connect FlexFabric mezzanine cards can be added.
The dual-port 10Gb HP Virtual Connect FlexFabric Adapter based
on Emulex OneConnect technology is embedded on the server
blade motherboard and can be partitioned into 4 FlexNICs.
HP ProLiant BL490c G7 Server Blade
Dense Compute
Nodes
Document # APP2012001 v10, August, 2012
The combination of blade servers, server virtualization and network virtualization, allow hundreds of
VMs to be deployed in a single cabinet.
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4. Killer App
Getting Started
The 1,100 rack servers which form the Vonage discrete production environment
are highly tuned for maximum performance and availability. The Vonage IT team
was skeptical a mass migration to virtual servers could be accomplished without
compromising one or both. Therefore the first step was to pilot the technology
with a single blade system chassis and 2 server blades.
It took about six weeks for Vonage architects to learn how to efficiently configure The migration project started with
a physical server with VMware ESXi, and HP VirtualConnect Flex-10. Then, one
a pilot using 2 server blades.
application at a time, the number of VMs in the Development & QA lab grew to
900. The confidence of the IT team also grew as applications running in the lab demonstrated the performance needed in a production environment.
Live Migrations Emerge as a Killer App for On-board 10GbE
Usage in the Development & QA Lab also demonstrated the
benefits of automated server performance optimization
and maintenance. With VMware Distributed Resource
Scheduler (DRS), scheduling server downtime to move applications to less utilized servers was no longer needed.
Without anyone knowing, DRS was automatically moving
VMs when servers became hot.
This made quick evacuation of VMs during vMotions a killer
application for the 10Gb HP Virtual Connect FlexFabric
Adapters onboard the G7 server blades. Vonage engineers
provisioned 4Gb FlexNICs to minimize the time required to
move hundreds of gigabytes of data involved in live migrations, and quickly found the vMotions over-running the 4Gb
bandwidth.
Each of 1,100 rack servers
has its own power &
cabling system.
Maintaining application performance during live migrations
means moving hundreds of gigabytes of data as fast as possible — a killer application for the 10GbE FlexFabric adapters.
Based on their experience in the lab, Vonage system architects decided to use 10Gb FlexNICs in production so
that ESXi has available the full bandwidth of the FlexFabric Adapter for live migrations.
DRS
A utility which allows ESXi admins to define the rules for manual or
automatic allocation of physical resources among VMs.
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5. Results & Lessons Learned
Mission Accomplished
Today Vonage is implementing dense compute nodes consisting of blade servers, server virtualization, and network virtualization technology. As a result, the company will
consolidate 1,100 rack-mount servers, 40 cabinets and 3,000 cables into only 2 cabinets, 4 blade server chassis, and a handful of cables. Along the way, Vonage architects
have identified a best practice for configuring I/O for live migrations, and a killer application for 10GbE.
Lessons Learned
The following are a few lessons the Vonage staff want to share with their peers:

Share your system designs with your vendors—Vonage architects discovered that
HP technical staff were aware of issues they encountered and would gladly have
reviewed their system design.

It takes a while to learn how the virtualization layers work together—It took six
weeks to learn how to use the server and network virtualization tools efficiently.
However, after learning proper configuration techniques, profiles can be cloned by
level 1 operators for rapid VM deployment.

One step at a time—18 months ago there was not a single VM in the Holmdel
Development & QA Lab. Starting with a couple of server blades, Vonage architects slowly added application workloads which allowed the rest of the IT team to
build confidence in the ability of VMs to perform.

vMotions can use an entire 10Gb Link—Testing showed that vMotions were saturating the 4Gb FlexNICs provisioned in the lab.
Before—Each of 1,100 rack
servers has its own power
and cabling system.
After—Power and cabling
for one chassis supports 16
server blades and 550 VMs.
Results
Before virtualization—40 cabinets, 27.5 servers per cabinet. After virtualization—2 cabinets, 2 blade server chassis per cabinet, 16 blade servers
per chassis, 17.2 VMs per blade server, 550 VMs per cabinet.
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6. Resources
Related Links
To learn more about the companies, technologies, and products mentioned in this report, visit the following
web pages:
HP FlexFabric Adapters Provided by Emulex
HP BladeSystem
HP VirtualConnect Technology
IT Brand Pulse
VMware ESXi 5.0
VMware vSphere Distributed Resource Manager
Vonage
About the Author
Frank Berry is founder and senior analyst for IT Brand Pulse, a trusted source of data
and analysis about IT infrastructure, including servers, storage and networking. As former vice president of product marketing and corporate marketing for QLogic, and vice
president of worldwide marketing for the automated tape library (ATL) division of Quantum, Mr. Berry has over 30 years experience in the development and marketing of IT
infrastructure. If you have any questions or comments about this report, contact
frank.berry@itbrandpulse.com.
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