I've always had a single physical server that is the qc mysql database for all our applications but it's now up to 85 schemas so I want to break it up along the same lines as production (where there's redundant pools of mysql servers by application class).
my basic question is whether it's better to run multiple instances on the same host or run single instances on multiple VMs on the same physical server. I can see slight advantages/disadvantages to each but no obvious upside nor downside to either. remember, this is dev/qc, not prod, so I'm leaning toward VMs so I don't have to manage port #s in configs or expect developers to remember that (also, I don't have to modify scripts for multiple instances, paths, etc). not big reasons for sure but all else equal I'll go the less work route and the only upside to multi I see is not having to reload the box as VM host. any compelling argument for either approach?
