>
>The IT guy thinks that if we store the MDF and LDFs on a central storage device (e.g. Nimble) and the SQL Server machine (VM) fails then all we have to do is fire up another VM with SQL Server installed on it and have it attach to the MDF and LDF files.
>
>I need to convince him that this really won't work because the MDF and LDFs were not properly detached. Sure, there are iffy workarounds, but I don't want to go there in a DR situation.
>
>I'd like to do this properly and I believe (not an expert) that we need to do this within the tools that MS SQL Server comes with. Again, my preference is to wait for SQL 2016 to come out...

Then you haven't eliminated a single point of failure, you've moved it to the central storage device.

With SQL mirroring + witness the entire server is redundant and the failover is automatic.