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virtual server

By Kinza Yasar

What is a virtual server?

A virtual server, also known as a virtual machine (VM), is a partitioned space inside a real server and is transparent to users, replicating the functionality of a dedicated physical server. Typically housed in the cloud or another off-site data center, a virtual server uses hardware and resources that are shared by several other users with varying levels of control.

Virtual servers make it easy to reallocate resources and adapt to dynamic workloads.

How does a virtual server work?

A virtualization software called a hypervisor partitions the physical server or the host machine into several VMs, with each running its own operating system (OS). The hypervisor's abstraction or isolation of the underlying host machine hardware enables the multiple VMs to effectively share the physical server's compute resources, such as network bandwidth and memory space.

In essence, the hypervisor functions as the host's OS by running on top of the server's hardware and giving VMs the isolation they need to function independently.

There are three essential types of virtualizations:

  1. Full virtualization. This virtualization occurs when the hypervisor controls all communication between the central processing unit (CPU) and the physical server. The hypervisor's primary duties include controlling the physical server's capacity and routing traffic to virtual servers to run particular applications.
  2. Paravirtualization. Through paravirtualization, the entire network of servers -- both physical and virtual -- is connected to act as one coherent unit. This form of virtualization only makes minimal use of the hypervisor's processing capability to manage OSes.
  3. OS-level virtualization. A hypervisor is not necessary for OS-level virtualization because the host OS manages capacity on its own. However, the only prerequisite for this kind of virtualization is that all of the virtual servers on the host must run the same OS.

A great example of server virtualization in action is a company that requires many server tasks, such as a web server for web hosting, a domain controller for internal user authentication, and a database server for storing and maintaining databases. The business can use server virtualization to create a number of virtual servers and consolidate all of these server tasks onto a single physical server rather than establishing numerous physical servers.

Benefits of a virtual server

Virtual servers provide various use cases and benefits for organizations from cost savings to instant scalability. Popular advantages of virtual servers include the following:

Disadvantages of a virtual server

Although virtual servers offer numerous advantages, they also have some drawbacks. The most frequent issues with virtual servers include the following:

Physical server vs. virtual server

A virtual server is an abstraction of a physical server, whereas a physical server is a piece of hardware with recognizable components, including a CPU, memory and a motherboard. A physical server can run any type of OS, such as Windows or Linux, but it can only run one OS in one instance.

The following are some differences between physical and virtual servers:

What is a virtual desktop?

A virtual desktop is a pre-configured image of OSes and applications in which the desktop environment is separated from the physical device used to access it. Users can connect to virtual desktops remotely or through a network. The desktop virtualization system known as virtual desktop infrastructure, or VDI, distributes virtual desktops to endpoint devices from an on-site or cloud-based data center, and users access the virtual desktop using peripherals, such as a mouse, keyboard and touchscreen.

For the end user, a virtual desktop feels similar to using a physical workstation. The user experience is far better as most of the resources, including storage and back-end databases, are readily available. However, depending on how it's set up, the majority of users cannot permanently install programs or store changes.

The OSes and computational power of virtual desktops are typically operated on VMs hosted by hypervisors rather than on physical machines, even though a virtual desktop and a VM are fully distinct from one another.

Since the early 2000s, server virtualization has advanced significantly and offers unparalleled advantages. Find out what the top 10 advantages of server virtualization are for enterprises.

07 Mar 2023

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