Virtualization Strategies for the CIOPhysical-to-virtual (P2V) conversions turn physical servers into virtual machines (VMs), but they can also play a part in the disaster recovery strategy for servers that remain in the physical realm.
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Some physical servers don’t make good VM candidates, often because of the “oomph” they require
to do their job. Most infrastructures tend to keep around a few physical servers that would use too
many resources if virtualized.
So how do you recover those servers when disaster strikes? Recovering a VM is fairly simple,
because its files are consolidated into a single virtual disk file, and it’s easy to replicate that
file to a secondary location. Things get trickier with physical servers, but you can use P2V
conversion to develop a virtualization
disaster recovery strategy.
Virtualization disaster recovery with P2V conversions
P2V migration isn’t just for converting physical machines to virtual ones. You can run a P2V
conversion on physical servers to strengthen a virtualization disaster recovery strategy. Instead
of turning on the virtual copy once the P2V migration is complete, though, keep the physical
instance running as usual. You then have a virtual copy of that physical computer with its files
nicely consolidated into a virtual disk, which can be easily replicated to a DR site.
Should you experience a disaster at your primary site, you can simply power on the virtual copy.
None of the usual “Start with the OS, layer data over the top” restore processes of yesteryear need
apply.
Obviously, you didn’t virtualize this system in the first place because of performance or other
concerns. But in a virtualization disaster recovery situation, you’re likely to have a much lower
load in the data center until you return to full production. It’s fine for the physical server to
function as a VM until then.
When operations return to normal, you can convert the virtual server back to a physical one. Virtual-to-physical
products combine with third-party P2V conversion products to get the server back to its final
physical resting place.
Anytime you virtualize a system that you didn’t intend to virtualize in the first place, you have
to be careful. Never turn on both systems at once. And as you develop a virtualization disaster
recovery strategy, plan for the additional resources that a virtual copy of the physical server
will use at the DR site.
For your own administrative sanity, consider investing in a third-party P2V
migration tool that automates the process and can update the virtual disk file with changes
between P2V activities. (You won’t find those features in many of the first-party tools, such
as
VMware Guided Consolidation or Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager.) The good news is
that most third-party P2V conversion tools aren’t terribly expensive, and they’ll save you time in
daily backups.
This was first published in March 2011
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