Overview
Country or Region:United States
Industry:Education—Community colleges
Customer Profile
The Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS) is a statewide network of 16 colleges and 67 campuses. Based in Versailles, Kentucky, KCTCS has more than 100,000 students and 8,000 employees.
Business Situation
KCTCS wanted an affordable solution that would help improve uptime and make it easier to implement new projects. It also sought to ease management of its distributed infrastructure.
Solution
KCTCS is deploying Windows Server®
2008 R2 with Hyper-V™ virtualization technology. The solution integrates with Microsoft® Exchange Server 2010 and other core applications.
Benefits
Increasesuptime to 99.9 percent
Improves scalability
Streamlines management
Cuts planning, deployment, and management costs / “Replicating our data center with physical servers wasn’t possible, because it cost too much. By using Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V, we estimate we can cut costs by almost 80 percent.”
Tony Eversole, IT Project Manager, Kentucky Community and Technical College System
The Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS) has statewide campuses and more than 100,000 students that depend on online access. To better serve them, KCTCS wanted a more flexible IT infrastructure and improved stability, but it also needed an affordable solution. KCTCS is meeting these goals by implementing Windows Server® 2008 R2 with Hyper-V™ virtualization technology. By deploying virtual servers, KCTCS will increase availability and cut server deployment time from hours to minutes. New management capabilities will ease administration, and tools such as Windows PowerShell™ 2.0 will streamline user-account provisioning and other routine tasks. Also, by using Hyper-V, KCTCS estimates that it will cut deployment costs for its virtual disaster recovery site by nearly 80 percent. Ultimately, the solution will help KCTCS support growth more affordably and efficiently.
Situation
The Kentucky Community and Technical College System (KCTCS) is a postsecondary education institution with 16 colleges and 67 campuses throughout the state. Based in Versailles, Kentucky, the community college system offers certificates, diplomas, and two-year associate degrees in more than 600 programs. Many students participate in the baccalaureate transfer program to earn an associate degree and then transfer to a four-year university in Kentucky. KCTCS has more than 100,000 students and 8,000 employees.
The college system strives to make general education and work-force training widely available through its network of campuses. In an effort to provide even more Kentucky residents with a college education, KCTCS began offering online courses in 2007. Because access to education is increasingly aligned with access to IT resources, the institution began looking at more ways to enhance service.
KCTCS upgrades its server computers and other hardware at four-year intervals, and began planning its next refresh in 2008. In addition to upgrading hardware, KCTCS wanted to improve the availability of core enterprise applications and services that include e-mail, collaboration tools, and human resources applications. With more than 100,000 people relying on the KCTCS administrators for service, uptime was critical. “Stability is a big thing for us,” says Tony Eversole, IT Project Manager at the Kentucky Community and Technical College System. “We don’t have true service level agreements with the colleges, but we definitely hear from them when something like the e-mail system goes down. E-mail is probably the most used application in our enterprise. Everyone—including students, faculty, and other staff—depends on it.”
To improve uptime, KCTCS decided to deploy a new disaster recovery site by replicating 41 production servers running in a central data center. Like many organizations, however, KCTCS faced increasing budget cuts, and it realized that the project would be too expensive with physical systems.
The challenge extended beyond the immediate need to ensure the availability of resources. KCTCS knew that the trend toward distance education and online education would only increase, and it wanted to adapt to changes in enrollment by being able to deploy new servers faster. Eversole says, “More students are connecting remotely, and our population of more than 100,000 students could easily grow to 200,000.”
Finally, faster server deployment was only one part of an overall need to simplify IT management. A small IT team remotely managed the central data center along with 80 domain controllers that are located across the state in branch campuses. The IT environment included different versions of the Windows® operating system, which complicated routine tasks such as deploying security updates. So in addition to improving availability, KCTCS wanted to deploy a standardized environment that would be easier to administer.
Solution
In June 2009, KCTCS decided to migrate its IT environment to the Windows Server® 2008 R2 Datacenter operating system and deploy Microsoft® Exchange Server 2010 Enterprise at the same time. It wanted a standardized IT environment and was interested in management tools and virtualization technology that are available in the new operating system. Also, by deploying Exchange Server 2010, KCTCS could take advantage of features such as more storage options and enhanced role-based administration tools that reduce the burden on IT staff. “The timing is good for us because we will get the newest Windows Server operating system along with the newest Exchange Server release,” says Eversole. “And the stability of Exchange Server 2010 with Windows Server 2008 R2 is great.”
Initially, the college system planned to deploy only Windows Server 2008 R2 on existing infrastructure. It used Microsoft Solution Accelerators such as the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit to determine the hardware and device compatibility of existing servers for the Windows Server 2008 R2 upgrade. But when it became an early adopter of Exchange Server 2010, KCTCS discovered that it could replace its storage area network with a lowercost, direct-attached storage solution. It then decided to deploy both Windows Server 2008 R2 and Exchange Server 2010 on multicore 64-bit processors.
The IT staff also wanted to take a closer look at Hyper-V™ virtualization technology. KCTCS knew that support for multicore processors combined with virtualization technology would facilitate greater consolidation. Windows Server 2008 R2 is the first Windows operating system to be offered for only 64-bit processors, which enhance performance and stability. Hyper-V technology extends the benefits of 64-bit computing further by supporting up to 64 logical processors in the host processor pool.
KCTCS tested new products such as Exchange Server 2010 and Microsoft Office Communications Server 2007 R2 in a lab environment with Windows Server 2008 R2 and Hyper-V. When it saw that other core software also ran well on Hyper-V, KCTCS realized that it had found the right solution for implementing a virtual disaster recovery site. Although KCTCS had tried a virtualization project from another vendor, it believed that Hyper-V was easier to manage and that applications running on it performed better.
The college system plans to upgrade its data center with 41 new server computers running Windows Server 2008 R2. With the help of the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit, KCTCS assessed the existing usage of current servers and learned that current workloads could run in a virtualized environment on fewer physical systems. It used the information to plan the next phase of the project, which includes a virtualized disaster recovery solution.
KCTCS will deploy Windows Server 2008 R2 on 41 IBM System x3650 M2 server computers in its data center. Then it will replicate the entire data center in a virtualized disaster recovery environment where 41 virtualized servers will run on fivephysical servers. The next phase will include upgrading domain controllers throughout the campus network with new server hardware and Windows Server 2008 R2.
Eversole and his colleagues will remotely manage the data center and domain controllers with Server Manager, which is built into Windows Server 2008 R2. The tool will play a key role in the deployment process as well; KCTCS administrators will use it to pre-stage domain controllers in the virtualized lab. Then they will copy the installation files to servers throughout the campus network. In addition to Server Manager, KCTCS will administer its disaster recovery environment with the Hyper-V Management Console and Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008. It will also use the Live Migration feature in Hyper-V to migrate virtual servers between physical hosts without taking applications or services offline.
KCTCS plans to take advantage of enhancements in the Active Directory® service, such as a module for the Windows PowerShell™ 2.0 command-line shell and scripting language that it can use to manage all Active Directory server roles. It also looks forward to new features such as Active Directory Recycle Bin—which it can use to recover deleted objects in a domain without having to take the domain controller offline—and the task-oriented Active Directory Administrative Center.
KCTCS expects to complete deployment by mid-2010 and is already exploring more Windows Server 2008 R2 capabilities. The central KCTCS data center and some of the colleges are interested in features that will improve access to applications and information. For example, instead of setting up a virtual private network, they could use the DirectAccess feature to connect external users to resources such as e-mail and intranets. KCTCS is considering using the Infrastructure Planning and Design Guide for DirectAccess with Microsoft Deployment Toolkit 2010 to simplify its DirectAccess design and deployment process.
Benefits
By using Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V, KCTCS expects to realize multiple benefits including 99.9 percent uptime and improved flexibility. Management will be easier and new IT projects will be more affordable—KCTCS estimates that it can cut deployment costs by 80 percent by using virtualization.
Increases Uptime to 99.9 Percent
KCTCS will be able to improve its level of service to staff and students by deploying Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V. “Stability is one of our primary goals. We need to keep systems up as long as possible,” says Eversole. “We’ll definitely see an improvement with Windows Server 2008 R2.”
With a new disaster recovery site and features such as Live Migration that keep servers online even during maintenance, KCTCS expects a significant increase in uptime. “Our uptime was already pretty high,” says Eversole. “But when you add the disaster recovery site running on Hyper-V, it will go even higher—perhaps from 99 to 99.9 percent.”
Improves Scalability
Although KCTCS is using Windows Server 2008 R2 to meet its immediate goals for ensuring high availability, it has future scalability in mind as well. “Now that we know that core applications such as Exchange Server 2010 and Office Communications Server 2007 R2 are supported on Hyper-V, we have the option to virtualize servers if we have an influx of 100,000 students,” says Eversole. “As the enterprise solution providers, we have to be able to adapt, and Hyper-V definitely facilitates that.”
Streamlines Management
Eversole points out that while virtual server deployment will ensure high availability for students and other users, it also has clear benefits for KCTCS administrators. “Once a virtual hard drive is created, it takes minutes to deploy a Hyper-V server versus the hours it can take to set up a physical server and install and configure applications.”
KCTCS administrators also expect to improve efficiency with enhanced management tools. “Windows PowerShell 2.0 in Windows Server 2008 R2 is a good thing—I can’t say enough about it,” says Eversole. “I can use scripts to completely automate my tedious manual job functions. For example, with our existing provisioning system, it takes four processes to provision user accounts, but with Windows PowerShell 2.0, we can do it in one step.”
Other management processes are similarly streamlined. “Currently we use a Remote Desktop Connection to access remote servers, and then run Server Manager on the local server to access event logs and other diagnostic information,” says Eversole. “But with Server Manager in Windows Server 2008 R2, we will be able to use just one console to remotely connect.”
Cuts Planning, Deployment, and Management Costs
Eversole is an early adopter and advocate of Microsoft Solution Accelerators. For the current project, he used tools such as the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit to create a full inventory of server computers and to identify which ones would be good candidates for consolidating with Hyper-V. He reduced implementation time by 10 days and cut costs by 80 percent as a result. “By using Microsoft Solution Accelerators, I significantly simplified the planning and deployment process of Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V,” says Eversole. “The Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit alone saved me five days of otherwise manual labor in inventorying servers and choosing virtualization candidates.”
Although KCTCS knew it needed to increase its server infrastructure to better serve its growing student community, taking on new projects with physical systems wasn’t in the budget. With Hyper-V technology, projects such as the new disaster recovery site are now within reach. “Replicating our data center with physical servers wasn’t possible, because it cost too much,” says Eversole. “By using Windows Server 2008 R2 with Hyper-V, we estimate we can cut costs by almost 80 percent.”
The smaller data center footprint for the disaster recovery site will also help KCTCS control management costs. KCTCS servers run offsite in a colocation center and KCTCS pays for each rack that is installed. “We can save money by consolidating as many servers as possible on each rack,” explains Eversole. “With Hyper-V, the replication of our entire data center can fit on one rack with 5 physical servers instead of four racks and 41 physical servers.”
For KCTCS, Windows Server 2008 R2 has come at the right time. “We have less money to spend, and the new disaster recovery site wasn’t possible before,” says Eversole. “And not just because of the cost—some of the applications weren’t supported in a virtualized environment. But now that they are, and now that we can afford it, it just makes sense to expand by using Hyper-V.”
Windows Server 2008 R2
Windows Server 2008 R2 is the latest version of the Windows Server operating system from Microsoft. With Windows Server 2008 R2, you can create solutions that are easier to plan, deploy, and manage than with previous versions of Windows Server. Building on the features, security, reliability, and performance provided by Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2 extends connectivity and control to local and remote resources. This means that your organization can benefit from reduced costs and increased efficiencies gained through enhanced management and control over resources across the enterprise
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