Metia CEP Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V_x000d_서버 호스팅 시장에 새로운 혁신 아이콘으로 등장

Microsoft Windows Server 2012

Customer Solution Case Study

Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V

All the Vouge for Advanced Virtual Server Hosting!

Overview

Country or Region: Korea

Industry: IT Service

Customer Profile

SimpleX Internet is a specialized IT company established in1999. It offers a variety of IT services, such as server hosting, web hosting, internet shopping malls, Internet advertising, and real-time stock news through its main ‘Cafe 24’ Brand.

Business Situation

While managing two different virtual server hosting infrastructures for Windows Server and Linux, SimpleX Internet tried to find a solution to resolve any possible inconvenience caused by operating system-dependent service.

Solution

SimpleX Internet tested for any degradation in performance when running Linux on Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V, compared to XenHypervisor, which is open source virtualization solution, and KVM environment. It also examined how to improve customer satisfaction using new features such as replication and QoS.

Benefits

Offering a wider selection

Improving customer satisfaction

Beneficial in terms of planning new services

“A considerable number of customers that use several servers, employ both Windows Server and Linux at the same time. For example, some customers use Linux for DNS server, and Raw-Media for Windows Server. When these customers wanted to move their servers to virtual server hosting, they needed to place servers on different infrastructure, whether Hyper-V or Xen Hypervisor/KVM depending on the operating system. However, from now on, we can provide a solution in which customers can run both Windows Server and Linux VM on a single server, if they wish”

Jo Sanghyeong, Deputy Head of the SimpleX Internet Sales Team

SimpleX Internet has thus far, enabled customers to enjoy the benefits of virtualization at a reasonable price through its hosting services. Most customers used Windows Server in tandem with Linux server, but the virtual server service was provided in a manner that could not integrate these together. SimpleX Internet was aware of this inconvenience. And with news of the launch of Windows Server 2012, SimpleX Internet did not hesitate, to investigate how Linux functioned running on Windows Server 2012. SimpleX Internet conducted tests concerning whether or not Linux VM on Windows Server 2012 would ensure performance comparable to Xen Hypervisor open source virtualization solution, and KVM. The test results surprised the SimpleX Internet engineers. Linux on Windows Server 2012 showed the same performance as CenOS on Xen Hypervisor and in particular, the disk I/O performance was twice better in Windows Server. With this result, SimpleX Internet plans to upgrade the company's service infrastructure to Windows Server 2012.

Situation

SimpleX Internet made history along during the development of the domestic hosting service industry. Since its founding in 1999, SimpleX has never forgotten its original goal of creating the best value for customers through the best service and technology development. Accordingly, it has always led innovation in response to technological paradigm shifts. SimpleX Internet was able to create Korea’s main ‘Cafe 24’, brand which has garnered three million members using the IT service provided by SimpleX Internet

SimpleX Internet, has led the industry in all aspects of technology and business, and in September, 2012 began spotlighting the goal of, creating customer value through the latest technology. The latest technology interesting SimpleX Internet's attention was Windows Server 2012. SimpleX Internet wanted to know how to make a use of Windows Server 2012, Microsoft's technological innovation encompassing Cloud OS. This new technology breaks the boundaries of traditional server operating systems and virtualization solutions.

Microsoft's Cloud OS answered SimpleX Internet's long-term concern about how to handle increased demand for virtual server hosting for its customers, which has been growing since the late 2000’s.

SimpleX Internet served the customers with ‘Cafe 24's’ virtual and tera-server hosting solutions. While planning and providing virtualization solutions for its customers, SimpleX Internet confronted previously unrevealed customer inconveniences. SimpleX Internet provided service on different infrastructure for customers using both Windows and Linux to host virtual servers. SimpleX Internet employees always asked questions about whether they considered it normal to run Windows Server on Hyper-V and Linux on open source Xen Hypervisor or KVM, and considered which would be most beneficial from the customer viewpoint. They sought improvements, instead of clinging to traditional service.

“Assume that company’s servers are running on different systems because they have different operating systems. If one server needs to access other server resources, traffic is caused, which results in increased costs and sometimes delays, depending on network conditions”, said Jo Sanghyeong, Deputy Head of the SimpleX Internet Sales Team. In this case, the solution is quite simple; running both Windows Server and Linux Virtual Machine (VM) on one system. However, the hosting industry hesitated to implement this simple and better solution for customers by reason of ensuring performance and operability. SimpleX Internet took part in the Windows Server 2012 Rapid Deployment Program (RDP) to be among the first to bring an end to this custom.

Solution

Through the Windows Server 2012 Rapid Development Program, SimpleX Internet wished to check the performance of Linux on Hyper-V. According to Jo Sanghyeong, most engineers who heard about the test opined that the performance of Linux on Windows Server would be far beyond that on Xen Hypervisor or KVM.

The engineers were concerned in creating the test environment, but the results were beyond expectations. The test showed that Linux running on Hyper-V was better in terms of performance. The server used for the test was a DELL R510 with 32GB of memory. Based on the same specifications, CentOS 6.2 VM was run on Xen Hypervisor and Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V and in these environments, performance was measured against load conditions made using the Linux built in stress program.

The performance test proceeded in three stages. In the first stage, performance was measured using the stress program built in Linux. In the second stage, the Phoronix test-suite test scenario was applie, and in the third stage, ApacheBench, the Apache stress tool, was used to measure performance. The test results using various scenarios and tools, showed Linux VM running on Hyper-V demonstrating better performance.

“When the load was placed, CPU usage or memory resources were substantially identical, but the I/O test for file creation indicated Linux VM performance on Windows Server as being double that of Linux VM on Xen Hypervisor. Most engineers believed that Xen Hypervisor would result in better performance in both host and guest environments, but the results, which showed double the performance in disk I/O were quite surprising”, Deputy Head Jo Sanghyeong said.

With this incredible test result, SimpleX Internet again tried all possible steps to ensure the reliability of benchmark data. SimpleX Internet changed the disk, thinking there could be a problem with the disk and ran the tool again. However, the result was the same. SimpleX Internet then tried changing the engineer in charge of the test, but the result was still the same, showing double the performance in disk I/O. SimpleX Internet also conducted a test to compare the performance of CenOS on KVM, an open sourced virtualization solution, and on Hyper-V. In setting the actual benchmark, SimpleX Internet agreed that Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V had improved in terms of I/O processing driver model and also that the I/O process improved on both Windows Server VM and Linux VM to ensure compatibility.

Benefits

Offering a wider selection

SimpleX Internet plans to upgrade its virtual server hosting and tera-server hosting environment to Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V. Through this upgrade, SimpleX Internet expects to offer a wider selection to its customers as the company can now help customers make better choices without the need for installing different infrastructures for Windows Server and Linux.

“A considerable number of customers that use several servers, employ both Windows Server and Linux at the same time. For example, some customers use Linux for DNS server, and Raw-Media for Windows Server. When these customers wanted to move their servers to virtual server hosting, they needed to place servers on different infrastructure, whether Hyper-V or Xen Hypervisor/KVM depending on the operating system. However, from now on, we can provide a solution in which customers can run both Windows Server and Linux VM on a single server, if they wish”, said the Deputy Head.

With no fear of performance degradation, SimpleX Internet can now plan solutions where customers can integrate and operate servers in a virtual environment regardless of operating system.

New possibility of improving customer satisfaction

Windows Server 2012 is expected to make great contributions in improving customer satisfaction for virtual server hosting services. SimpleX Internet, carefully examined new features introduced in Windows Server 2012 through the Windows Server 2012 Rapid Development Program. In doing so, it found one feature that could satisfy the customers when applied to commercialized service, which was Hyper-V's QoS support.

SimpleX Internet's virtualization solution opens and manages bandwidth by physical server rather than assigning network bandwidth to individual VM. Customized management that suits the needs of individual customers will be available in the Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V environment as it controls the QoS of each VM.

“In an environment where several customers’ VMs are stored, a great deal of traffic by one customer affects other customers, resulting in decreased satisfaction with the service. If QoS control is available in the virtual environment, it is possible to prevent certain conditions where specific VMs cause excessive traffic delays to other customer's VMs”, said Jo Sanghyeong.

Beneficial in terms of planning new services

SimpleX Internet has great interest in developing various Windows Server 2012 Hyper-V based services. Windows Server 2012 with Cloud OS features, permits the hosting service provider to try many new things for its customers. Through the Windows Service 2012 Rapid Development Program, SimpleX Internet found the Hyper-V Replica feature attractive enough to commercialize right away.

Businiess cannot continue in the modern world once IT stops. Accordingly, Disaster Recovery (DR) has become a hot issue. The problem is that unlike major companies, enterprises using a hosting service cannot afford the investment in DR. For SimpleX Internet, Hyper-V's Replica feature seemed like a new way to ensure business continuity at a reasonable price.

“SimpleX Internet has two Data Centers in Monkdong and Ilsan. This program gave us a chance to think about developing a solution enabling customers that run VMs on Hyper-V to immediately recover their systems regardless of where the problem is located”, Deputy Head Jo Sanghyeong, added.

Microsoft Server Product Portfolio

For more information about the Microsoft server product portfolio, go to:

www.microsoft.com/servers

For More Information

For more information about Microsoft products and services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Information Centre at (877) 568-2495. Customers in the United States and Canada who are deaf or hard-of-hearing can reach Microsoft text telephone (TTY/TDD) services at (800) 892-5234. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information using the World Wide Web, go to:

www.microsoft.com

For more information about SimpleX Internet’s services, call 82-2-3284-0300 or visit the website at: simplexi.com