Due to the rapid evolution of technology, businesses are replacing physical servers with more flexible, scalable, and cost-effective virtual options. Server virtualization remains the backbone of modern web hosting and cloud computing. In addition, it helps manage, deliver, and consume resources more efficiently.
Virtual servers are modernized software replicas of physical servers. They operate on machines hosting multiple virtual servers through a hypervisor. Each virtual server operates and is treated as a standalone computer and has an OS, resources, and applications. They operate independently but share the underlying hardware.
In this comprehensive guide on virtual servers, we look into their key advantages, their common use cases, the types available today, and their overall workings. In case you are a business owner looking to explore hosting options, or you are a beginner, this guide aims to build a strong understanding of virtualization and its importance.
Defining a Virtual Server: The Core Concept
As a virtual server is a software-based server, its operating system emulates a physical server’s functionality. Virtual servers let users run applications and services without needing a dedicated hardware. A virtual server is located with a physical server and is created with virtualization technology, which allows a single physical machine to run multiple virtual machines separately.
Virtual servers and physical machines are enabled with virtual machines (VMs), which are self-contained units. Each VM is allocated its own operating system, storage, CPU, and memory. However, all the VMs share the resources of the single physical host server. To put it simply, a virtual server is configured as a virtual machine to execute server-specific functions such as hosting websites, running databases, or managing network operations.
Physical servers are divided within into virtual servers or VMs. Organizations enable faster application deployment, decrease operational overheads, and maximize hardware utilization. The capability to run multiple independent environments is the revolutionary feature of virtualization that has changed IT and cloud computing.
How Does Virtual Server Work: Understanding the Role of the Hypervisor
The hypervisor is the central component of virtualization software that supports the operation of one or more virtual servers. It enables the usage of one physical server as multiple virtual servers and allocates the physical hardware parts like the CPU, memory, storage, and networking resources. It makes sure that every single virtual server has sufficient resources of the single physical server and operates independently.
Based on the structure of hypervisors, there are two predominant types: Type 1 or bare-metal hypervisors, and Type 2 or hosted hypervisors. A Type 1 hypervisor is attached directly to the hardware and does not need a separate host OS turning it into a bare-metal server. This gives a bare-metal server better performance, throughput, and resilience, which is ideal for data centers and enterprise-grade cloud hosting. Type 2 hypervisors, in contrast, are more prevalent for personal use and testing, as these types of hypervisors run on top of an existing OS.
After installing a hypervisor, a hypervisor can now divide a physical server into multiple, separate virtual servers, also called Virtual Machines (VMs). Each virtual server is able to operate its own OS, whether it be Windows, Linux, or others, and host different applications depending on user needs. Each virtual server is completely separate because of the hypervisor, and so what happens in one virtual server (crash, software updates) will not affect the others.
Consider a virtual server to be akin to an apartment in a skyscraper. Each flat or apartment (as virtual servers) has an address (IP), an interior (OS and apps), and utilities (RAM, CPU, and storage). The building (Physical server) is managed by the building manager (hypervisor), who makes sure that every flat or apartment receives equal services such as water, electricity, and internet. The manager ensures that such services never run out and that the flats or apartments would not interfere with one another.
By decoupling the software server environment from the physical hardware, these virtualized servers can be relocated, cloned, or scaled with little to no downtime. Because of such flexibility, this architecture has a wide variety of benefits such as lower hardware costs, quicker server deployment, greater scalability, easier server maintenance, and better resource optimization.
Physical Server vs Virtual Server: A Head-to-Head Comparision
Hardware Dependancy
Physical Server
Investing in a physical server also means investing in a box which includes a complete processor, memory, storage, and networking components. Each server that is deployed will have a dedicated box. In cases when components fail, the server requires a repair or a replacement, so that means it goes down. With physical servers, this is a problem as there is no hardware and server abstraction.
Physical servers will be less flexible and will make hindering meaningless moves, similar to the workloads and operating systems, dependent on the machine. Its performance and its capacity will continue to be hindered by the limits of that device.
Virtual Server
In the case of virtual servers, spending is less and loads have the potential of increasing, allowing virtual servers and hypervisors to exist inside a virtual machine independently. Each virtual machine is allowed to act in its own designated virtual environment. Thanks to the hypervisor, a physical server can have multiple virtual servers. This hardware and server decoupling provides more abstraction and flexibility.
In the case when there is a limit to the physical device resources, risks such as hardware failure will be mitigated, especially when there is automatic recovery and migration to a new host. This is especially true for the data center and cloud environment.
Resource Waste
Physical Server
Physical servers today are often operated below their across-the-board resource rates. For instance, a server may come with 12 cores and 64 GB of RAM, but only a fraction of that is leveraged during daily operations. Such a scenario leads to underutilized infrastructure and increased energy consumption.
In addition to that, servers come with fixed resource allocation due to set resource allocation. For example, if one application has a sudden spike in resource demand, it cannot draw resources from other idle servers. This creates inefficiency in allocation during scaling.
Virtual Server
Resource sharing is a problem that has been tackled with virtual servers. Each virtual server (VM) is assigned a fixed amount of resources (CPU, RAM, and Storage) but can dynamically draw from a hypervisor. This means that virtual servers can adapt to changing workloads without requiring reconfiguration and hardware elevation.
In addition to providing businesses and hosting providers more flexibility, virtual servers also lower sharing resource hardware costs. Optimizing resources with lower costs increases efficiency in performance. This is how hosting providers and businesses are able to run more workloads on their hardware.
Upfront Investment
Physical Server
Minimum hardware and infrastructure requirements to run cooling and power add to the upfront investment of setting up a physical server. Even custom enterprise hardware is needed, along with IT staff for on-going maintenance requirements, physical servers become a much more costly solution for businesses.
Apart from the hardware, the business incurs additional expenses such as the Operating System and software licensing fees. It’s certainly not an attractive scenario for a business keen on starting on a shoestring budget or one that seeks to scale quickly without incurring a lot of capital expenditure.
Virtual Server
A far lower cost barrier is associated with virtual servers. You only pay for the virtual servers on a monthly or hourly basis. For developers and even larger enterprises, virtual servers are cost effective and help scale smartly since they are hosted on a shared infrastructure.
Virtual servers can now be launched within minutes as there is no hardware to buy and no physical locations to manage. Budgeting becomes easier as well, since there are no long term resource commitments, and resources can be scaled up or down as needed.
Maintenance & Management
Physical Server
Physical servers slow down IT operations since most of the tasks require physical access to the servers, which is time consuming. All hands are not needed to maintain physical servers, since hardware issues like a failing power supply can be corrected remotely.
Basic maintenance like dusting, power supply checking, and failing hard drive replacement not only add to the cost, but if not monitored, incurs prolonged downtimes.
Virtual Server
Virtual servers can be maintained using soft wares and control suites. Employing cloud consoles and virtualization management tools, you can remotely reboot, restore, upgrade, and monitor your servers. This greatly minimizes the need for physical presence while significantly cutting down the time to resolution.
In the case of encountering any issues, virtual servers can be restored from snapshots or cloned within minutes. Management of virtual machines has become far more efficient and scalable because snapshots and patches are updated on all VMs at once.
Scalability
Physical Server
Scaling up a physical server means upgrading to better, newer hardware or buying more servers. Both of these choices come with a considerable time, cost, and effort. Take for instance, trying to add more RAM; this will surely cause downtime, and if you are low on expansion slots, you will be forced to upgrade to new machines.
Because of this reluctance and physical factors, scaling becomes reactive and not proactive. Systems are likely to crash with a sudden uptick in traffic, and, in the meantime, additional servers need to be deployed to handle the load.
Virtual Server
Virtual servers are scalable by default. In most situations, additional RAM, CPU, or storage can be procured with a click. This becomes invaluable in cloud ecosystems where demand can be erratic.
Virtual servers still stand as the most favorable choice for most businesses because of the flexibility they provide during peak and off-peak months. These servers can be scaled up during holidays and scaled down during the quieter months to save costs. Being able to instantly respond to your business needs is the biggest advantage of virtual servers.
Deployment Time
Physical Server
The downtime associated with purchasing servers can be extremely time consuming. As virtualization has become the norm, purchasing the physical server equipment is only the first step. Next, one has to wait for the equipment to be shipped, install the server into a rack, setup OS, and finally configure the network. All of these steps can take anywhere from a couple to a few weeks.
The slow rollout physical infrastructures offer makes them poorly suited for agile teams that rapidly look to develop, test, or scale. Infact, no business framework would stand to benefit from having a physical server.
Virtual Server
Virtual servers can be ready to go within minutes for a business, making them extremely favorable for a multitude of reasons. Reputable hosting providers offer ready-to-go templates so users can easily put their desired OS, needed resources, and a click away from launching. Providing the ability to scale and experiment without a single worry, virtual servers come with a plethora of reasons to choose them.
Additionaly, IaC (Infrastructure as Code) makes the virtual servers interoperable into your DevOps workflow, something that is only wishful thinking with physical servers.
Glossary: Infrastructure as Code (IaC) is a method of managing and provisioning IT infrastructure using code instead of manual processes, automating tasks like server, storage, and network configuration.
Read more about difference between physical server and virtual server
Benefits of Virtual Servers
Expense
Cost saving stands out as one of the benefits provided by virtual servers. Virtual servers have the capability to run multiple units on a single physical machine, meaning an investment is not needed for additional hardware. Businesses of all sorts will also spend less on physical space, cabling, and ongoing energy consumption, which is helpful for large server rooms or data centers. Other capital expenditures that will be reduced are server and networking gear and infrastructure like cooling and power.
Moreover, virtual servers are charged on a pay-as-you-go basis in the cloud, where CPU, RAM, and storage are billed only when used. Spending is predictable and budgeting is far easier to manage. Virtual servers are not burdened by depreciation or long-term costs, and small to mid size companies will not have to pay for dedicated IT staff, licensing, or hardware. This makes virtual servers a great option for startups and mid sized companies.
Flexibility
Virtual servers are capable of providing the ability to smooth supply and demand with rapid flexibility. Memory, CPU, and space may be adjusted in real-time allowing businesses to scale up and down when needed. Businesses with fluctuating workloads, or seasonal demand will find great value in these features.
The agility discussed above enables IT and developer teams to initiate new applications or services within minutes. If the new applications or services need hosting or provisioning, you can do that virtually in no time at all. Responding to the needs of the customers is a major competitive upside in this industry.
Resource Optimization
In comparison to physical servers, virtual servers make it possible to optimize resource allocation. Virtual servers enable more efficient resource pooling and distribution across multiple virtual machines, alleviating the traditional problem of some servers being overloaded while others sit underutilized.
Through dynamic resource allocation, resource distribution is more efficient as allocation responds to need in real time. For example, if one virtual server requires more computation power, the hypervisor can allocate more CPU to that virtual machine from the shared resource. Improving resource utilization reduces waste and optimizes data center operations.
Flexibility and Moveability
Moveability and flexibility of virtual servers is unmatched, and that is arguably their most distinguishing advantage. Virtual machines can be transferred from one physical host to another. This can be done without any associated downtime, which is helpful for maintenance, upgrades, or balancing the load. Physical servers do not have this option.
The processes of cloning, backing up, or restoring VMs are done rapidly. In cases where an application is required to be shifted from one data center or cloud provider to another, virtualization makes things easier since the virtual machine image can be sliced and used seamlessly. Due to its ease of use, virtual servers are a go to option when needing to simplify different processes. Restoration and disaster recovery are simplified, as well as testing and deployment in varying environments.
Drawbacks of Virtual Servers
Performance Overhead
Like anything, virtual servers have their pros and cons. One of the problems virtual servers have is the performance overhead. A single virtual server’s performance might be compromised as a result of multiple virtual servers being housed on a single machine. In cases where the hardware is overprovisioned, performance sluggishness is very much likely during peak loads due to the existing demand for system resources.
System resources also have to be shared due to the nature of virtualization, and portions of those resources used for hosting hypervisors. This makes hypervisor systems perform worse than bare metal setups due to them losing portions of their resources. This could be beneficial in cases where the application in use does not have requirements of having a dedicated machine and is more forgiving, like in the case of real time processing.
Security Issues
Virtual environments face security threats just like any other type of technology. A significant case of an example would be the “noisy neighbor” issue, in which one VM that has been compromised will degrade the performance of the other VM on the same physical host. Because all virtual servers share physical resources, they are prone to attacks when the host machine is compromised.
Additionally, there is the “Single Point of Failure” issue. The virtual machines that are hosted on one physical server are fully dependent on that server. If that server gets compromised, all the VMs will be non-functional. Though there are ways to reduce the violation of availability, there is still risk, therefore strong isolation, patching, and monitoring is crucial in ensuring security in virtual systems environments.
Applications and Use Cases of Virtual servers
With the continuous improvements in technology, virtual servers have become an important aspect to different industries. They have become helpful, and also, affordable with the rise of cloud hosting services. Instead of buying and maintaining a physical server, users get virtual servers from cloud hosting services like Cantech for their websites, websites data, databases, their e-commerce systems, and also, for e-content. Virtual servers are very flexible in a way that users can adjust the needed resources for traffic.
An additional important application of the technology is in the software development and testing Windows. Virtual servers are essential for software developers as they need clear separate windows for building, testing, and staging applications. These windows are created and discarded in minutes, which is essential for agile workflows and CI/CD. Virtualization is integral for developers as they can simulate different OS configurations and cross-platform test to ensure the code is working as required without impacting the production environment.
In addition to these, virtualization is important for enterprise applications as well as Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI). Corporations maintain CRMs, ERPs, and other critical business applications on virtual servers for their accessibility, backup, and recovery features. Another similar application is the virtual desktop which provides users with a desktop experience through virtual machines. This technology empowers employees to access their working environment from any location and through any device which enhances the remote working model, centralized security, and simplified IT administration.
Final Thoughts: Server Infrastructure Moving Forward
The advancement of virtual servers transformed cloud computing and began reinforcing businesses of all scales. Businesses are now able to manage their applications and infrastructure far more nimbly. Whether it be a basic web page or sophisticated enterprise applications, virtualization serves as the backbone for dependability and optimal results.
This virtualization technology serves as a substantial strategic tool rather than only a cost-effective one. Server virtualization assists companies in optimizing resources, reducing downtimes, and managing workloads more effectively without constant hardware updates. In a fast-paced market, constant remote work, and a need for virtual servers, businesses need to be agile to maintain relevancy.
Virtual servers have been substantially aided by companies like Cantech providing web hosting services centered around agility, safety, and swift scaling. Cantech assists the infrastructure and hosting expansion requirements for anything ranging from personal blogs, e-commerce sites, to enterprise grade systems. For those involved in IT, development, or digital infrastructure, understanding this emerging technology and its possibilities is mandatory.
