Power Up with SQL Server: SQL Server Virtualization

Here's a list of additional resources for attendees of my SQL Server Virtualization Session. Feel free to contact me if anything you were hoping to find here isn't listed.

There were also lots of questions towards the end of this session – if I wasn't able to answer your question, just contact me directly.

Virtualization Background

Demystifying SQL Server Virtualization
http://www.sqlmag.com/Article/ArticleID/99841/sql_server_99841.html

SQL Server Virtualization FAQs
http://www.sqlmag.com/Article/ArticleID/97264/SQL_Server_Virtualization_FAQs.html

HyperVisors (Wikipedia)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypervisor

Hardware Assisted Virtualization
http://virtualizationreview.com/articles/2009/01/01/hardwareassisted-virtualization.aspx

Hyper-V vs VMware
(though published earlier this year, this article is already out of date)
http://searchservervirtualization.techtarget.com/news/article/0,289142,sid94_gci1346926,00.html

SQL Server 2008 Virtualization Page
http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/2008/en/us/virtualization.aspx

Virtualization Benefits

VMware's vSphere 4 and SQL Server
http://blogs.vmware.com/performance/2009/06/sql-sever-performance-on-vsphere.html
http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/perf_vsphere_sql_scalability.pdf

VMware Marketing about Virtualization/SQL Server Benefits
http://www.vmware.com/solutions/business-critical-apps/sql/resources.html

Microsoft Marketing about Virtualization/SQL Server Benefits
http://blogs.technet.com/dataplatforminsider/archive/2009/09/02/microsoft-virtualization-best-choices-for-sql-server.aspx

Virtualization Concerns

Microsoft's Official Support statement for Virtualized SQL Server
http://support.microsoft.com/KB/956893

Detailed Licensing Information from Microsoft
http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/2005/en/us/Special-Considerations.aspx

Less Detailed Licensing (but still overly complex)
http://download.microsoft.com/download/6/c/c/6ccc82b3-d254-4cb7-bada-62a720ae4598/Licensing_Microsoft_Server_Products_in_Virtual_Environments.doc

Performance Monitoring/Tuning

Performance Monitoring on VMware Guests
http://sqlblog.com/blogs/rick_heiges/archive/2009/06/03/perfmon-for-vmware-esx.aspx

Performance Monitoring on Hyper-V Guests
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc768535%28BTS.10%29.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/tvoellm/archive/2009/04/23/monitoring-hyper-v-performance.aspx

Stress Testing

SQLIO
Stupid Name. Fantastic tool (one that I recommended for SQL Mag's recent list of free tools)
http://www.microsoft.com/DOWNLOADS/details.aspx?familyid=9A8B005B-84E4-4F24-8D65-CB53442D9E19&displaylang=en

IOMeter
Not a bad tool – harder to set up and use than SQLIO though
http://www.iometer.org/

Memory Testing
As Linchi points out: data is old/dated. But the concepts here are great.
http://sqlblog.com/blogs/linchi_shea/archive/2009/07/29/performance-impact-memory-effectiveness-of-virtualization.aspx 

Virtualized IO

SQL Server and SAN Interactions
http://blogs.msdn.com/joesack/archive/2009/01/28/sql-server-and-hba-queue-depth-mashup.aspx

SQL Server, SANs, and Virtualization
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/SAN/65101/

VMware Guidance on SAN Design/Implementation
(a bit dated, but concepts are still great)
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vi3_san_design_deploy.pdf

SQL Server Best Practices

Best Practices Home
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sqlserver/bb671432.aspx

Predeployment IO Best Practices
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc966412.aspx

SQL Server on Hyper-V Best Practices and Performance Recommendations
http://sqlcat.com/whitepapers/archive/2008/10/03/running-sql-server-2008-in-a-hyper-v-environment-best-practices-and-performance-recommendations.aspx

Performance Best Practices for vSphere 4.0
http://www.vmware.com/pdf/Perf_Best_Practices_vSphere4.0.pdf

Microsoft SQL Server and VMware Virtual Infrastructure (Best Practices)
http://www.vmware.com/resources/techresources/10002

SQL Server Performance in VMware 3
http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/resources/sql_server_performance_vi3_wp.pdf