Server virtualization. Help ease space and reduce cost.

Your Energy Diet Starts with Great Processors.

Home › Resource Centers › Business / Enterprise ›

Simplify your server environment and increase flexibility with virtualization. Intel® architecture-based servers provide breakthrough performance and proven reliability for the foundation of your virtualized environment.

Reduce costs. Intel® technology-based virtualization solutions enable you to consolidate more applications on fewer physical servers, help avoid costly data center expansion by lowering management costs.

Build performance. With Quad-Core Intel® Xeon® processors, you get performance and headroom to improve the average virtualization performance by as much as 2.5x over dual-core systems.¹ Intel® Virtualization Technology (Intel® VT) reduces the need for compute-intensive software translations between the guest and host operating systems.²

Age of existing servers
Quad-Core performance gain

Number of existing servers for consolidation
Desired consolidation ratio
Annual cost savings

Improve manageability. Virtualization lets you manage multiple servers as a single pool of resources, moving and balancing workloads among them without service interruption.

Discuss server products and technologies with IT experts in the server zone ›

Virtualize on Intel® processors

Quad-Core Intel® Xeon® processor 5300 or 5400 series delivers four energy-efficient processor cores and Intel Virtualization Technology to deliver the most headroom for virtualization on a 2P server. Now you can maximize system utilization and reduce costs by seamlessly consolidating your server resources, all while getting record-setting performance.³

Quad-Core Intel® Xeon® processor 7300 series based on the Intel® Core™ microarchitecture, offers leading scalable 4P–32P performance, expandable memory and I/O options server and best-in-class virtualization for server consolidation, providing support for more Virtual Machines on a single server.

	Dual-Core Intel® Itanium® processor 9100 series delivers increased performance over previous generations and continued advancements in mainframe-class reliability with Intel® Cache Safe Technology and Enhanced Machine Check Architecture, while lowering energy requirements.

Real world virtualization model

Figure 1. Tests demonstrate performance and power savings running consolidated CPU-intensive workloads. Intel internal measurements, July 2007.		In Intel IT tests, a four-socket server based on the Quad-Core Intel Xeon processor 7300 series demonstrated scalable, predictable performance with up to 32 consolidated server workloads in virtual machines (VMs). Results show the ability of the Quad-Core Intel Xeon processor 7300 series to achieve high levels of consolidation in busy enterprise data center environments. Read about scalable performance for server consolidation in virtualized environments › (PDF 185KB)

Processor technologies

Intel® processors are built to provide excellent server virtualization, with Intel Virtualization Technology and innovations across the key system components that drive headroom for virtualized environments:

Increase processor resources. Multi-core architecture, a dedicated high-speed front-side bus, and the innovations of the Intel® Core™ microarchitecture combine to provide breakthrough energy-efficient performance.
Improve memory performance. Fully-Buffered DIMM Memory in the Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors minimizes bottlenecks within the memory subsystem. IT replaces the shared memory bus with a serial point-to-point lane and a dedicated buffer for each memory module, allowing dramatically improved memory efficiency and performance.
Reduce system latency with accelerated I/O. Intel® Input/Output Acceleration Technology (Intel® I/OAT) enables more efficient network data movement. PCI Express* provides an effective data-transfer rate of 4 Gbit/s per lane, allowing for composite interconnect rates as high as 64 Gbit/s.

Top virtualization downloads

Choosing the right hardware for server virtualization › (PDF 196KB)

Read this new IDC whitepaper to learn the importance of choosing the right hardware for server virtualization.

View the virtualization animated demo ›

Boost server utilization by consolidating multiple environments onto a single server.

Read the virtualization technology brief › (PDF 593KB)

Create flexible, robust infrastructure using virtualization.

Help my virtualized data center: video white paper ›

Change what your business can do by utilizing quad-core.

Expanding value through accelerated IT refresh › (PDF 575KB)

Capture the value of quad-core servers for your business through refresh and virtualization. Boost flexibility, save space, and reduce costs.

Read IT@Intel's full virtualization brief › (PDF 187KB)

Learn how Intel IT improved performance by 1.6x and reduced costs by up to 30% with virtualization on Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors 5300 series.

Performance tests and ratings are measured using specific computer systems and/or components and reflect the approximate performance of Intel® products as measured by those tests. Any difference in system hardware or software design or configuration may affect actual performance. Buyers should consult other sources of information to evaluate the performance of systems or components they are considering purchasing. For more information on performance tests and on the performance of Intel products, visit Intel Performance Benchmark Limitations.

¹ Performance measured using the vConsolidate* benchmark result published on Virtual Iron* 4.0 software. Intel internal, early platform measurements comparing system configurations of four Quad-Core Intel® Xeon® processors X7350 Series, 2.93GHz, 8MB L2 cache with four Dual-Core Intel® Xeon® processors 7140M, 3.40 GHz with 16M L3 cache, 800 MHz system bus.

² * Intel® Virtualization Technology (Intel® VT), Intel® Trusted Execution Technology (Intel® TXT), and Intel® 64 architecture require a computer system with a processor, chipset, BIOS, enabling software and/or operating system, device drivers and applications designed for these features. Performance will vary depending on your configuration. Contact your vendor for more information.

³ See performance site for full details: www.intel.com/performance/server/xeon/intthru.htm.