I've never actually messed with virtualization, but I like having multiple pieces of hardware. Each of these servers are business critical for different things so I cringe and that thought of everything failing at once. Well, 5 are critical, 1's a backup and 2 could be rebuilt rather easily. Ideally what I'd like to have is a backup generator with a small ups to to keep it going during switch over, but I work for a very cheap company that doesn't like to spend much.
I submitted the cost of battery replacement on the original setup, we'll see what they come back with. I may push the generator idea.