This week’s blog kicks off a series of Data Center blogs that will feature insights from 3Com Data Center Product Marketing Manager, John Gray.
By John Gray
It’s no secret that over the next few years, your data center is going to be expected to handle a lot of new applications without missing a beat in supporting your current lineup. You’re going to have to architect an infrastructure that can handle large-scale, resource-intensive research projects, highly collaborative networks and real-time high-definition video learning.
The aim of your organization in bringing these apps onboard or improving them is to boost student learning as well as attract new faculty, grants and donations. Therefore, blips in operations because your infrastructure can’t handle these new technologies would not be well tolerated.
These blips generally come about because the network is incapable of handling the additional traffic. After all, the applications we mentioned above all can do a number on bandwidth and overall infrastructure capacity. Solving the saturation problems that stem from these applications can lead to a tremendously complex data center.
In a discussion with Phil Hochmuth, a senior analyst with Yankee Group Research in Boston, he describes this troublesome phenomenon in more detail. “When an organization has a new application, IT typically adds a new server cluster to the network. When the network gets congested or performance falls below par, IT adds more bandwidth,” he says. He calls it an add-and-upgrade cycle that is detrimental to the health of the data center. Hochmuth concludes, “It’s too costly and doesn’t solve the underlying issues.”
We’ve come to realize that the underlying problem lies in the traditional three-tier data center model of access, aggregation and core switching. Each tier has myriad protocols, technologies and management – a true nightmare if what you seek is simplification and resiliency. In fact, too often, a majority of an IT organization’s time, money and effort is spent keeping systems running, the infrastructure operational and the disaster recovery plans functional. Those types of distractions will certainly lead to the failure of university data centers as you try to take on more innovative projects.
To avoid this game-ending outcome, you must rethink the way you approach the data center. Rather than relying on out-of-date, non-interoperable infrastructure, it’s time to consider the new era of purpose-built technology that addresses the needs of emerging applications. Such state-of-the-art, sophisticated management tools and infrastructure will help you not only adopt new applications, but also improve the performance of your existing systems. In other words, you’ll be the proud leader of a successful next-generation data center.
Over the next few blogs, we’ll discuss in detail some strategies for building the next-generation data center, including data center simplification, server I/O consolidation, the migration from Gigabit Ethernet to 10 Gigabit Ethernet, the energy efficient mindset, and last but certainly not least, security and business continuity. We’ll show you why these five areas are the blocks on which you can lay the foundation for your next-generation data center.
