Virtualization Essentials

Protecting Multiple Virtual Machines

There are solutions to minimize the chances of a server failure. Since the 1980s, there have been commercially available fault-tolerant solutions that relied on software and then hardware to prevent server outages. Fault-tolerant hardware uses redundant systems, down to the cooling fans and the power supplies, sometimes with the duplicate power cords plugged into separate electrical grids. With such designs, a single component failure won’t bring down an application. These systems were originally aimed at organizations that needed extraordinary uptime such as emergency services or flight control systems. Soon businesses that had critical transactional windows began using them as well—financial service companies ...