Installing windows server on virtual machine to simulate network environment?

[stoymigo]

Here's what I'd like to know, is it possible to install sql server on windows server as a virtual machine setup, in order to access it from my pc which is a windwos xp pc.
Would I be able to access that server from another pc as well?

I plan to do it for testing purposes, as if I was on a network.
Thanks.

 

[Pho3nix]

You would but your going to have to do something to the "pipes" on SQL to allow you to connect to the SQL Server from your XP Machine.

 

[stoymigo]

Okay I'll look at that, another thing is speed is not an issue now but as it does become I'd setup a partition for that.
Just that the "virtual" setup can come in handy.

 

[Frikkenator]

Okay I'll look at that, another thing is speed is not an issue now but as it does become I'd setup a partition for that.
Just that the "virtual" setup can come in handy.

Just remember for a production environment, SQL does perform much better on physical servers as opposed to VMs. In most cases this wouldn't matter though as it runs "well enough" on a VM, but if you need exceptional performance, keep that in mind.

 

[PsyWulf]

Entirely doable,no more configuration needed than a physical machine,bridge the network and connect as usual

 

[SBSP]

Depends on how its setup, comparing performance VMs VS Physical is a thing of the past.
Most servers and even PC's have Virtual technology assistance in the BIOS.

The only issue is Memory, you need lots and lots.

I'm Running VMware ESXI ontop of
2 Dell R710s with with 48GB ram on each and the smallest HDDs i could find 145GB SAS drives. RAID1 on each server.
Both server's nics are truncated on a switch and connected to a netapp file server. and the VM datastores are located on the fileserver.

One would think that this kind of setup will be slow since virtual HDDs are located on the network.
But its not slow at all , And I have 11VMs running. All of them which are Server 2008 and i have SQL 2008, IIS, Terminal servers ,Proxy servers, SCCM DC with AD ect ect .


And it has not given me a day's problem