HP SIM5 & VC 2.0

[Halil Tulumbaci]

Hi,
I've the following important questions:

- It is possible and supported HP SIM5 SP5 and VC 2.0 on a single Proliant server for a small environment with 40 servers (= at the beginning of the project 40 physical nodes and then at the end 40 VMs)? Do you know any port-conflicts (HP SIM https-port 50000 can't be changed, but during the Installation of VC 2.0 I've the option to change the ports)?

- It is possible and supported to virtualize HP SIM5 SP5 into a VM running on ESX 3.0 (with SMP-feature P2V from a second HP SIM5 SP5 ProLiant server) ?

- It is possible and supported the clustering of HP SIM5 SP5 with MS 2-node-cluster (Windows Server 2003 SP1, Enterprise Edition) one cluster-node on a ProLiant server and the other cluster-Node as a VM on a ESX 3.0 server? I know that the two physical clustering solution of HP SIM5 SP5 is supported.

Thanks in advance,
Halil

[Rob Buxton · Accepted solution]

Previous responses from HP have stated that HPSIM is not supported on a Virtual Server.

I'm not aware of any port conflicts, but here we have VC on a separate server. Thta's just a loading thing, we have WSUS & HPSIM on one and CommandView EVA and VC on a second.

[Halil Tulumbaci]

Hi Rob,

Thanks for your response.

You have an interesting mix "WSUS & HPSIM" and "CommandView EVA & VC"....By the way....where is your database-server (SQL or MSDE?)? Are all these combinations supported? How many items (vm & physical server) are you managing? What are the underlying ProLiant servers?

I'm very interested in the "physical to virtual clustering" of HP SIM in small virtualized environments concerning to keep the number of physical hardware to a minimum. The failover or move of the HP SIM from the physical node to the vm on the ESX is ONLY intended for failure scenario of the physical hardware and for the purposes of maintenance (like firmware updates) because hardware management must go on.

Thanks in advance,
Halil

[Rob Buxton]

We use a backend SQL Server database for HPSIM, it's also used for WSUS and VC.

The split of applications was done purely on when applications were needed. The original server was getting quite busy with HPSIM and the supporting applications. So a second server was bought to run the CV EVA and VC as these were new applications for us.

I've currently got three VMWare ESX Servers in a single VMWare Cluster. I've a fourth VMWare ESX Server still on 2.5.3 which I'm using as a staging post for P2V migrations. We're only running 14 guests at the moment but we have a number of P2V's to schedule over the next few months. When VMM is available for ESX 3 then the fourth server will be upgraded to ESX 4 and added to the cluster.
VMWare ESX Servers are DL 385 G1's with 17GB of memory each and 2 x dual core CPU's.

[Halil Tulumbaci]

Hi Rob,

Thanks for your response.

I also wanted to know the underlying ProLiant servers of your two "Mix-Servers" and the "license-optimized" SQL-Server.

By the way I searched the forum and find an interesting message from David Claypool concerning "Running HP SIM on Virtual Machine":

"Yes, it can be done. Generally speaking, don't do it unless you have to."

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=845099

Thanks in advance,
Halil

[Rob Buxton]

Our HPSIM server is an older DL380 G3, the CV EVA / VC Server is a new DL360 G5 with a single Dual Core cpu and 3GB of Memory with a couple of FC Cards.

Not quite sure what you mean by a "licensed optimised" SQL Server, but that is also a DL380 G3 with a couple of CPU's.