* Will my existing infrastructure be suitable for Virtualization?
* How do I know how many physical hosts I will need?
* What is the best option for storage?
* Will my critical applications be at risk?
* Will the initial outlay be too high to justify the later cost savings?
* How will I convince the board to invest in the project?
Ultimately, only one thing will answer all these questions and enable an informed decision to be made – The Capacity Plan.
Interestingly though, the capacity plan itself raises many questions – who to do it, how much might it cost, who will analyze it?
There are many ways to generate 100% unbiased information from your businesses infrastructure in order to make the calculated decision regarding virtualization. Capacity planning will provide you with exact information regarding your systems performance, total storage, processor utilization, disk I/Os and much more – even down to server makes, models and serial numbers!
In the early days of virtualization, there was a significant cost associated with the capacity plan process, either for the end user or the engineer/analyst. This is no longer the case, many organizations, including mine, are offering the service free of charge, on the basis that you consider a quotation for a consolidation/containment implementation once the process is complete.