Virtualizing Microsoft Tier 1 Applications with VMware vSphere 4

Virtualize mission-critical Microsoft applications

How do you safely deploy Tier 1 apps in virtual environments? In this in-depth guide, VMware insiders Charles A. Windom, Hemant Gaidhani, and Alex Fontana show you how. Focusing on Microsoft applications, they guide you step by step through a Proof of Concept for virtualizing Windows Server, Active Directory, Internet Information Services, Exchange Server, SQL Server, SharePoint Server, and Remote Desktop Services—all on the VMware vSphere 4 platform.

You'll find out what to consider for each application before you virtualize it, and learn how to perform VM backup using VMware Data Recovery, Windows patch management using VMware Update Manager, application performance monitoring using VMware Appspeed, and more. Topics include:

A Thorough Overview of VMware vSphere 4

Infrastructure Services

Application Services

Management Services (part of VMware vCenter Server)

Virtualizing Windows Server® 2008

Choose virtual hardware and learn how to add sufficient CPU and memory

Run Microsoft Windows Server 2008 as a guest inside the vSphere environment

Protect your applications and data and deliver high availability using Failover Clustering and Windows Network Load Balancing

Virtualizing Other Microsoft Applications

Active Directory®

Internet Information Services 7.0

Exchange Server 2007 and 2010

SQL Server 2005 and 2008

SharePoint® Server 2007

Remote Desktop Services 2008 R2