September 23, 2008 at 3:26 am
Dear All
I am after some opinions as to wether our IM&T department have completely lost it or wether I'm guilty of trying to cut corners. I head up an Informatics function for a public sector organization in the UK. The organization does not currently have a dedicated SQL Server nor a data warehouse. In order to move this forward I have requested that we have SQL Server 2005 installed (the 64 bit standard edition) on a virtual server, of not particularly high spec e.g. 4GB RAM and a 100GB disk space(as the network is virtualised). They have come back to inform that this will take approximately 5 days whole time equivilancy (37.5 hours to do). Bearing in mind that we will be administering the server ourselves so there is no setup around database nor users in this timescale just installation.
Am I unreasonable or shouldn't this take a few hours?
September 23, 2008 at 3:47 am
I would look to do this work in half a day, but then my section is geared up to carry out this work regularly on a standardised and scripted basis.
If there is no existing SQL Server, then there will be a lot of planning work to be done first. Plus if they are unfamiliar with installing SQL Server 2005 then this may take a lot longer. A week doesn't sound that extreme to me IF they are attempting to make a good job of it.
September 23, 2008 at 7:47 am
Dear Old Hand
They manage a substantial number of SQL Servers within their environment and are actually a dedicated team of engineers to manage the virtual Network. I was thinking in the region of half a day myself, however this is the first request for a SQL Server 2005 installation., so I thought this may add some extra time so was thinking a couple of days (max really).
The planning of the database the ETL functions, the DBA and housekeeping functions all sit within the remit of my team. So the work I'm being quoted for is just the installation.
Many thanks for you reply.
Rob A
September 23, 2008 at 7:57 am
Even if they don't have anything scripted, you can install Windows Server on a Vitual image in about 30 mins - 2 hours depending on speed and options selected. Granted they probably already have a 'default' Win 2k3 or 2k8 image that they can just copy, rename etc and they are off and running but I digress...
About 30 to 60 minutes to lock down the server.
about 30-120 minutes to install SQL Server 05 again depending on speed and competency. If the DBA will not be a part of this, and they are quoting that much time, why not just have them stand up a default Windows install and have one of your Jr. DBA's do the SQL install?
a Week does seem a bit extreme, unless they don't have the media or ISOs and they have the slowest connection on earth to pull them down from MS...
-Luke.
September 23, 2008 at 8:19 am
Hi Robert
As other said that this is half a days job, max of a day, in case if there is not SQL server installed on Virtual servers, if your have a clone machine on Virtual server this comes handy( 30 minutes to 1 hour to create a new server and add drives).
Even if you are creating a new Windows server and SQL 2005 on it then it will take half a day.( if you know what you exactly need)
Cheers
🙂
September 23, 2008 at 8:30 am
Dear Luke
Would happily do it ourselves but we don't have the access to do it. Anyway I'm sure that we can come to a better agreement on timescales in light of the responses I have received.
Thanks for your contribution.
Rob A
September 23, 2008 at 8:32 am
They will have images for the operating system servers so as I thought their just negotiating for time so we can compromise on a couple of days.
September 23, 2008 at 8:42 am
It's half a day if they have time. I've worked with clients and they schedule out work, so they don't necessarily have time to dedicate right away. They might have days of other work to do, and so they pad the schedule to that they're not giving you a work time, but a total time. That may or may not be the case.
There also could be issues with setting up the physical server, etc. If they say this is total dedicated time, they're way off.
I'd be careful of this on a VM. Be sure that you have strong IO paths setup.
September 23, 2008 at 9:27 am
I'd be careful of this on a VM. Be sure that you have strong IO paths setup.
Great comment! SQL Server on a VM can be VERY slow due to poor VM I/O performance. My VM I/O is about 8 times slower than my production hardware.
Robert--
37.5 hours? Just for installing? On a VM? I'd read the fine print, because they are being way too cautious (as in CYA...). It is possible that installing Windows Server may take a whole day, but only because of waiting on updates to apply, which should not be billable time in my opinion, because the server is doing the work.
I'd say you're being taken advantage of! The time estimates above are far more realistic if the only task is installing SQL Server 2005 in a VM.
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bkDBA
0.175 seconds -- 10 year average margin of victory at the Daytona 500
212 Degrees
September 23, 2008 at 12:36 pm
bkDBA (9/23/2008)
SQL Server on a VM can be VERY slow due to poor VM I/O performance. My VM I/O is about 8 times slower than my production hardware.
what virtualisation platform are you using?
5 days to build a SQL server is a little OTT
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"Ya can't make an omelette without breaking just a few eggs" 😉
September 23, 2008 at 1:39 pm
Perry Whittle (9/23/2008)
bkDBA (9/23/2008)
SQL Server on a VM can be VERY slow due to poor VM I/O performance. My VM I/O is about 8 times slower than my production hardware.what virtualisation platform are you using?
Microsoft VM, but I'm not convinced the VM hardware is configured properly...that's the IT Admin's job...
_______________
bkDBA
0.175 seconds -- 10 year average margin of victory at the Daytona 500
212 Degrees
September 23, 2008 at 1:56 pm
bkDBA (9/23/2008)
Perry Whittle (9/23/2008)
bkDBA (9/23/2008)
Microsoft VM,
are you using the Windows 2008 hyper V or Virtual 2005 Enterprise?
I had a 2 node SQL cluster running on my machine sometime ago for test purposes but i wouldnt run a SQL VM in anger on either of the above platforms.
We have a number of SQL VM's on VMWare ESX server 3.5, all our VM's are connected to a Clarion SAN with over 15TB of storage, we never get a problem 😉
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"Ya can't make an omelette without breaking just a few eggs" 😉
September 23, 2008 at 2:01 pm
MS VS 2005R2... SQL 2000 and 2008 seem to work well enough for testing things out.
_______________
bkDBA
0.175 seconds -- 10 year average margin of victory at the Daytona 500
212 Degrees
September 23, 2008 at 2:06 pm
yes VS 2005 Ent was what i used for local VM's. As i said i wouldnt attempt to run a SQL VM in anger on these platforms due to the limitations and lack of security in the hyper visor
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"Ya can't make an omelette without breaking just a few eggs" 😉
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