Item: IBM Turbonomic
Rating: 10
Author: Scott Trautwein

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Our entire school district uses turbonomic for our VDI infrastructure. We have 350 virtual desktops on 8 hosts. We use turbonomic to load balance the resources automatically and to drill down into the data on any specific issues.

Pros and Cons

Automatically handles vmotion for all assigned desktops. It can be set to further customize ram and vCPU sizes as well.
Reporting is easy to use and access. It allows you to drill down into each virtual machine if necessary.
Provides a list of recommendations on the first panel of the customizable dashboard. It's never pushy, recommendations are just that, [you] never have to follow them.

The upfront cost is significant. After the initial purchase, the maintenance costs are very reasonable. But if they offered a basic version for less we would have definitely considered it.

Return on Investment

All host resources are spread out evenly, no matter what time of day. Gives us an always optimized environment for our users.
No negative impact. If the turbonomic virtual appliance were to fail or lockup (which has only happened once), it does not cause any ill effects to the infrastructure.

Managing Virtual / Cloud Environments with IBM Turbonomic

We use it strictly for automatinig vmotion tasks to enable a balanced set of memory and CPU resources across our hosts. Once the parameters are set we are able to just let it work on its own, no further action is required. Also, we occasionally get into its reporting functions to verify certain vms have the resources they require.

Alternatives Considered

We didn't really consider any other vendors. I know VMware has an option, but I was not interested in VMware's pricing model.

Other Software Used

GFI VIPRE, VMware vCenter Server

Likelihood to Recommend

It is well suited for anyone utilizing a VDI and needs to have all resources load balanced without any intervention on their part. It also would be useful for large server implementations, upsizing and downsizing system specs as necessary.

If you have VMs on hosts with limited resources, turbonomic is very helpful.

Support Rating

All issues I've had they have been able to resolve quickly. They are very responsive and don't waste your time with basic troubleshooting steps (reboot the device, turn it off/on....)

IBM Turbonomic Customer Support Pros and Cons

Pros	Cons
Quick Resolution Good followup Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed No escalation required Immediate help available Support understands my problem Support cares about my success Quick Initial Response	None

Turbonomic review for school district

Software Version

Overall Satisfaction with Turbonomic (formerly VMTurbo)