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David Bullock
Asked: 2011-04-29 07:01:54 +0800 CST

Can I virtualise both SBS premium servers atop a Hyper-V "core" installation?

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Assuming it were permitted by licensing, does the following configuration for getting both SBS premium servers running on the same box work technically?

  1. Install the allowed 'physical' instance of SBS 2008 'add on' server on the bare metal, with only the Hyper-V profile (and possibly the GUI-free 'core' installation mode). Do not have it a member of a domain.
  2. Install the instance of SBS 2008 'main' server atop #1
  3. Install the allowed 'virtual' instance of SBS 2008 'add on' server atop #1

Aside from contention on I/O, memory, CPU, etc, are there any reasons not to do this?

hyper-v windows-sbs-2008

2 Answers

  1. Well both the SBS and add-on pack include a W2K8 Standard licence and each standard licence entitles you to 1 host and 1 VM via their 'Virtual Image Use Rights'. So yes, you'll be covered by this completely.

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  2. Best Answer

    Yes. Quoting the license agreement:

    You may run, at any one time, one instance of the server software in one physical or virtual operating system environment on the licensed server.

    So your "Standard" SBS can be installed on a Hyper-V Server (note that I said Hyper-V Server, which is a free product from Microsoft; it is not part of or on the SBS DVDs. You have to download this separately from MS).

    Because Premium Edition is designed to run on one or two servers, you may separate the server software and run one instance of each of the following components in one physical or virtual operating system environment

    The "Premium" server can be another VM on the same Hyper-V Server, or at your option, on a physically different server, including running on that server's bare metal or as a VM under a hypervisor (such as the free Hyper-V server mentioned above).

    You may not install a Core version of the SBS server, add the Hyper-V role, then create two VMs within it for the "Standard" and "Premium" SBS servers.

    From a technical standpoint it's a good idea to separate the roles into at least the two VMs. Most modern hardware can easily handle running two VMs, though it typically needs a bit more RAM and HD space. CPUs are rarely a bottleneck these days.

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