Possible to make a VM Host that is energy efficient?

mac_cnc

mac_cnc

2[H]4U
Joined
Oct 14, 2000
Messages
2,560
Like the topic implies is it possible to keep your power usage low on VM host? I want to make a machine I can use for labs that wont be running 500 watts constantly. Anyone currently doing this want to share some insight?
 
If 500 watts is really your benchmark, that's not even really a question at all. But guessing that you're just asking in general, intel xeon (SB or IB) based vm hosts run particularly light on the power, and are probably the best you can ask for in a capable host. Of course, the higher strain you put on it will ramp up the draw, but still should be very low regardless.
 
Sure, new machines are pretty power efficient. Dell T320's with 48gb of ram, 6-8 drives (at least a couple of them 15k sas), & perc710 controller sits at around 110-130 watts with 3-4 windows vm's running.
 
I have 2 machines built with Ivy Bridge Celerons (G540 and G550), they run together at less than 300w.

One has 4 drives, the other has 2.

EDIT: Forgot to add, this easily runs 4-5 VMs on each host with capacity for more.
 
Last edited:
I have a laptop running esx, about 12-14 watts with 1 drive, 19.5 watts with a 2nd drive in the optical bay. Super quiet.

Also 500 watts is very high. My main rig is a 6 core, 32gb ram, 2 video cards, 3 nics, an hba, 6 750gb drives and it draws less than 200watts.
 
Last edited:
I have a SAN with 16 drives. 1 Host with 96 gigs of ram HP G8, one asus x34XX with 32 gigs only pulling about 350 watts.
 
i have my Mini-ESXi Boxes, they use Ivy/Sandy tech and very low powered... but thats home lab stuff :)
Main goal is to use my //Viper connection in my Sig with 2x 750GB Seagate Momentus XT's with the Lefthand VSA or VMware VSA stuff

Google Pocket Sized ESXi box!

My Main lab i think consumes about 350-400W and they are Dual Xeons 60W's
 
Last edited:
My host is very efficent.. 150w (drives not spun down) with GPU Idle.. got an e3 1240v2 32 gigs of ram and 13 hard drives(12x3tb Reds with 1tb green and 2 ssds)...(this also has my cable modem, wireless router, and a vera on it). Spinning the drives down saves another 45w.. Max is about 250-300 with GPU going full blast..
 
My Hyper-V host:
Dell R515 Server
Dual AMD Opteron 4176 HE
128GB RAM
Fully populated with 14 drives.
Server 2008 R2

Max power usage ever: 357W
Average: 288W
 
It's funny how this thread is about power efficient VM hosts, and some of these hosts are 200-300W. Running these setups would triple my electricity bill. That is definitely not what I would consider power efficient.

As a power efficient host, you could either use a newer laptop based on e.g. i5-2520M (Sandy Bridge) or i5-3320M (Ivy Bridge). These CPUs support all the virtualization technologies. If you need more power or other features, you could build a host around the Intel DQ77KB motherboard, along with an i7-3770S. This board is very power efficient, and would draw around 20W at idle. It has dual NICs and slots for mSATA SSD and mini-PCIe WLAN, if you also want to replace your wireless router (and take its power budget).
 
We've given examples of low power systems. But keep in mind...some of these high power usage systems are much more powerful and can support many more VMs. You have to add up the whole environment.

My 3 nodes idle at 38w each.
 
And speaking of my lab...just bumped up a second host to 32GB. Working with Zerto in the lab so I split one of the three off as a "DR site". Also deployed vCloud Director.
 
I think a big question here is how big?

As a thought here is my 5A colo setup:
2x HP V1910-24G
2x Dell C6100 XS23-TY3 each with:
Redundant PSUs
1x L5520 w/ 12GB
2x Dual L5520 w/ 48GB

So six total nodes, two switches many SSDs and 2x 3TB drives. Not great but not bad.

Idle on each chassis is sub 200w.

Here are some tennants:
1. Ditch SAS drives and controllers! Use a single larger SSD like an Intel S3700. That route tends to see less failures and recovering RAID arrays tend to lose performance. Figure several watts saved per drive used and another 15+ for a RAID card.
2. Use low power CPUs. Xeon E3's (including L versions), but even the 5500/ 5600 series L CPU's were not bad. Today's dual E5-2430L is fairly similar performance wise to the L5640's and are low power consumption plays.
3. Use more power efficient fans. Some server fans use a huge amount of power in the tens of watts range.
4. Correctly size your 80+ gold or platinum PSU. A 1kW PSU pushing a 1A @ 120V is not going to be efficient.
 
Esben said:
It's funny how this thread is about power efficient VM hosts, and some of these hosts are 200-300W. Running these setups would triple my electricity bill. That is definitely not what I would consider power efficient.

As a power efficient host, you could either use a newer laptop based on e.g. i5-2520M (Sandy Bridge) or i5-3320M (Ivy Bridge). These CPUs support all the virtualization technologies. If you need more power or other features, you could build a host around the Intel DQ77KB motherboard, along with an i7-3770S. This board is very power efficient, and would draw around 20W at idle. It has dual NICs and slots for mSATA SSD and mini-PCIe WLAN, if you also want to replace your wireless router (and take its power budget).
Click to expand...

LOL I was thinking the same thing.... A standard IVB cpu, a couple of HDDS, and even a HD7xxx series graphics card and you can still keep it under 60W. If you have very active VMs then maybe a bit more.

@PJkenned: Couldn't agree more with #4. Even an 80+ GOLD PSU might be under 80% efficient if it's running at 10% or below. Swap a 1KW for a 400W PSU and you could actually cut your power usage another 10W.
 
I think you have to realize a lot of us work with equipment at work that makes 300w look like nothing.

We have switches that pull 10x that, let alone servers and SANs.
 
In my house - easily fits under your "500 watt" goal:

- I5-3470T, Intel DQ77KB, 16GB ram, 400Gb Patriot SSD, 250GB Mushkin mSATA SSD. 4 main clients and others for trials - FreePBX, Server 08 running IIS for small web site, MythTV backend (with HD Homerun Prime network tuners) and Blue Iris NVR for security cameras. Completely passively cooled in an Akasa Euler heatsink case - no fans at all. 17 Watts idle, 40 watts running balls out.
 
Yeah, it's do-able. I've got a 2x L5420, 24GB RAM, and 4x 1TB SATA system. Uses ~170watts at full load. Newer CPUs can give better performance, with even lower power usage.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top