Limit to number Of Virtual Machines

[Alan Casey]

Is there a limit to the number of Virtual Machines you can create on a single HP-UX Itanium Blade server?

[Torsten. · Accepted solution]

It's well hidden in the manual, but found:

version 3

"There is no set limit to the number of virtual machines that can be configured, but no more than 256 virtual machines can be booted simultaneously on a single VM Host"

The first limit you will hit is the available amount of memory...

[Tim Nelson]

The quick specs at http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12715_div/12715_div.HTML
state up to 20 IVMs per core.

Reality is that each IVM must reserver at least 5% of the CPU. So 5% * 20 = 100%. If your reserve per is higher then adjust accourdingly.

Another reality, eventually you will run out of memory as well. So, if you have 4GB of ram:
-1GB for VM Host
-1GB for each VM Guest OS
At a maximum with 4GB of ram you could only have 3 Guests running only the OS.
( and this would be tight ) and does not take into account any application needs.

So the real answer is......It depends on what your environement is like and what you are intending to use each one for.

[Alan Casey]

thanks guys, that basically answers my question.
We're looking at having 8 partitions.
So I guess we just need to spec the blade to 8 times the min requirement for or db server etc