Plan for using PerformancePoint Server 2007 in a Hyper-V virtual environment

Hyper-V must be configured in a server role on 64-bit editions of Windows Server 2008. Additionally, make sure that the physical hardware supports hardware-assisted virtualization. This means that the processor must be compatible with Intel VT or AMD Virtualization (AMD-V) technology, and the system BIOS must support Data Execution Prevention (DEP). DEP must be enabled.

Support for third-party hypervisor technology

We recommend that you install PerformancePoint Server, 64-bit edition on a virtual machine that is running the 64-bit edition of either Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or Office SharePoint Server 2007 on Windows Server 2008.

The following are recommendations for setting up PerformancePoint Server in a Hyper-V environment.

• Review the documents described in "Other resources" below as a prerequisite to deploying Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or Office SharePoint Server 2007 in a virtual environment.

• Review and follow the published PerformancePoint Server, Windows SharePoint Services, and Office SharePoint Server guidance for hardware selection, performance, and scalability. For more information, see Performance tuning and capacity planning for PerformancePoint Server 2007) and Plan for performance and capacity (Office SharePoint Server). The preceding documents include guidance for Microsoft SQL Server 2005.

• Any Hyper-V virtual server must meet the requirements of the physical server (for example, CPUs, memory, and disk I/O) that you are going to run as a Hyper-V guest. As with all virtual technologies, there is an overhead cost on the host computer for each virtual machine.

• Do not use the Hyper-V snapshot feature on virtual servers that are connected to a SharePoint Products and Technologies server farm. This is because the timer services and the search applications might become unsynchronized during the snapshot process, and once the snapshot is finished errors or inconsistencies can arise.

• Do not use more virtual CPUs than there are physical CPUs on the Hyper-V host computer. Although using Hyper-V you can allocate more virtual CPUs than the number of physical CPUs, this causes performance issues because the hypervisor software has to swap out CPU contexts.

• Leverage virtual networks. Using Hyper-V you can configure the following types of virtual networks:

  • Private: The virtual machines on the private network can communicate with each other.

  • Internal: The virtual machines can communicate with each other and with the host computer.

  • External: The virtual machines can communicate with each other, the host computer, and computers on the physical network.

  Private networks and internal networks do not use the physical network card or cable, so communications are faster and network congestion is minimized. You can take advantage of this network performance gain by creating an external network for the front-end Web servers and by creating a private or internal network for the application and SQL Server database servers.

The following table provides important information about resources for Hyper-V, PerformancePoint Server, SharePoint Products and Technologies, and SQL Server 2008.

In any scenario, a virtual server running PerformancePoint Server has the same minimum, and fundamental, requirements as a physical server running PerformancePoint Server. Virtualization provides many benefits; however, it does not eliminate or circumvent the existing requirements and best practices that relate to deploying, configuring, and maintaining a PerformancePoint Server environment.