Physical machines without virtualisation.
WHAT THEY PROVIDE
All of the hardware, with no hypervisor overhead Predictable performance No neighbours Full hardware control
WHAT THEY SUIT
Sustained high load Licensing tied to physical cores Workloads sensitive to latency variation Regulatory requirements for physical isolation
WHAT THEY COST
Slower provisioning Less flexibility Capacity that cannot be resized quickly Hardware failure affecting the whole machine
WHAT THAT LAST POINT REQUIRES
Redundancy at the application level, or rapid replacement.
WHAT TO PROVIDE AS A PROVIDER
Out-of-band management, independent of the operating system Remote power control Console access Rescue environments
WHY OUT-OF-BAND MANAGEMENT MATTERS MOST
It is how a machine is recovered when it will not boot.
WHAT TO SECURE ABSOLUTELY
That management interface.
WHY
It provides complete control, and must never be reachable from the internet.
WHAT TO AUTOMATE
Provisioning, through network installation.
WHAT TO PLAN
Hardware failure, spares, and replacement time.
WHAT TO RECORD
Every machine, its configuration, and its warranty status.
