I have to agree with Stefan, make sure you allocate the recommended resources 
as per IBM best practices and virtualized ISP servers will serve you well.

All of my DR instances have been virtual for several years now, and in 
production I am preparing to virtual both backup and OC server(s).

An additional benefit for me is I create a VM template with all the Spectrum 
Protect software loaded, but not configured. When needed it only takes a few 
minutes to stand up a new or replacement ISP VM.

My only issue was after my virtual backup servers were built my VMWare admins 
went back and robbed them of CPU and memory resources claiming that the 
resources were excessive. When they came under full production performance was 
dismal.  As a part of agreeing to virtualize the production environment I made 
sure that management understood, and approved, the minimum system/instance 
requirements as documented in the IBM blueprints document. 


-Rick Adamson



-----Original Message-----
From: ADSM: Dist Stor Manager [mailto:ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU] On Behalf Of 
Stefan Folkerts
Sent: Friday, January 08, 2016 3:19 AM
To: ADSM-L AT VM.MARIST DOT EDU
Subject: Re: [ADSM-L] VM Server for Monitoring/Reporting?

I don't understand the need for real metal servers other than when you connect 
tape or need to do lan-free transport to tape (again, to have supported 
connection to tape).
Tape libraries connected to VMware vSphere are not supported (don't know the 
current state) but the rest is just software running on an OS, why would 
Spectrum Protect need to run on dedicated metal when other software doesn't?

In my lab setup I even run tape connected on VMware and that works fine since 
version 5.5 of VMware, but that isn't supported so don't try and do that, you 
can and probably will run into problems at some stage, I have seen purple 
screens of death and have seen entire vSphere hosts go down due to library 
issues on versions prior to 5.5 in my lab setup :-)

I have implemented Spectrum Protect servers virtualized, it's supported and it 
runs fine, just make sure you give it enough resources, you can't treat it like 
some small VM and I do give it dedicated storage (both for metadata and for 
data capacity and I mean controllers and storage, not just disks) but then it 
runs just fine.

The advantage is that you automatically have increased availability due to 
VMware HA and have super fast backups for the machines running on the same 
physical box.

When it comes to reporting/monitor software I wouldn't think twice about it if 
it isn't stated that it is unsupported.


On Thu, Jan 7, 2016 at 9:51 PM, Vandeventer, Harold [OITS] < Harold.Vandeventer 
AT ks DOT gov> wrote:

> I fully understand the need for real metal for the TSM/Spectrum 
> Protect node-backup and Operation Center servers.
>
> Is anyone running something relatively benign like 7.1 
> Monitoring/Reporting on a VM?
>
> I've got an old physical box, but need to add RAM.
>
> My management is pushing the "why not VM" solution.
>
>
>
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