Bladewatch.com

http://www.storwize.com/PR/StorwizeSTN6000i.pdf

LOS GATOS, Calif., April 6, 2009 – Storwize, the market leader in primary storage optimization, today announced its new STN-6000i Series appliance. The STN-6000i is the first capacity optimization solution to universally reduce data on primary and secondary (backup) storage while also enhancing storage performance efficiency, enabling IT organizations to achieve operational and cost efficiencies in IT infrastructure and bandwidth, as well as associated power, cooling and floor space costs.

“Now, more than ever, cost containment is a key concern. Data reduction technologies for primary data and secondary copies of data can help drive down costs by using less storage, and can, perhaps, extend the useful life of currently deployed solutions,” said Dave Russell, Gartner Research Vice President. “IT directors and storage administrators responsible for primary storage, backup/recovery and/or disaster recovery will want to consider solutions for their ability to reduce storage capacity requirements throughout the data lifecycle.”

Anything the vendors can do to aid in the management and provisioning of storage has to be a good thing, being able to cope with the various business needs in the storage world whilst managing capacity can be a challenge for all concerned.

Let’s not forget that my inability to allocate storage is my problem, but I can so easily make it a business problem, therefore how we report and act on those reports becomes so important – to avoid those which project/platform doesn’t get their storage allocated as Front Office need their new system brought online.

How we store our data, what procedures for compression, for archiving data to disk become ever more important – simply limiting user profiles, deleting legacy log files can all affect the performance of the storage and it’s ability to replicate/respond in real time.

The Storwize appliance sounds interesting, I’ll need to check it out.

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Techtarget

Now that virtualization deployments are creeping out of test beds and extending more deeply into corporate data centers, a serious challenge has risen: How can organizations manage these increasingly complex environments?

In February, market researcher IDC reported that 56% of companies with complex virtualization implementations believe that close management of this technology will be critical for reaching their business goals. Approximately 80% of IDC’s survey respondents managing more than 50 virtual machines (VMs) said they apply, or plan to apply, Information Technology Infrastructure Library management practices. Another 70% use, or plan to use, software management tools, and the same percentage is looking toward automation as a critical component.

Management both in terms of the technology (making it all fit together, work together) and in terms of process, of reporting and ownership.  How you adopt this platform will depend on you and your business, there’s the one unified platform for business, the business aligned model ‘HR, sales and accounts’ component infrastructures, both represent challenges, and benefits. The right model for you is the one which gives you the benefit of the most consolidation per platform at the ‘lowest’ operational cost, unifying everything on one ESX farm might be brilliant, but not if you’re at risk of damaging the relationship, the buy-in from a business line or department, where you draw the line is the challenge.

I’m hoping we’ll see more in the development of managing and reporting tools as well as assistance with process from how to log a call, to best practices and steps around the ITIL kind of models.

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Hardware Zone

Manila, Philippines — EMC Corporation recently announced EMC SourceOne — a new family of products and solutions for archiving, e-discovery and compliance — aimed at helping companies centrally manage multiple content types in order to apply consistent retention, disposition and overall lifecycle management. With EMC SourceOne, customers can save more than 50 percent in total cost of ownership, achieve payback on the solution in as little as 12 months, ensure compliance to internal governance policies and external industry regulations, and mitigate risks associated with e-discovery.

EMC SourceOne delivers an integrated approach to information governance through the use of archiving as a foundational technology, enhanced by retention and disposition capabilities for effective information management as well as e-discovery as a repeatable business process. Initially, EMC SourceOne will archive e-mail and instant messages. Support for files, SharePoint, enterprise applications, XML and other content types will be added in the future. For companies with 1,000 mailboxes, savings from EMC SourceOne will average $1 million in a single year. Companies can also realize a reduction of up to 60 percent in storage and backup costs.

Compliance is a topic on many CIO’s, many managers radar, anything the vendors can do to aid in the management, security and governance of data has to be a good thing. I’ll need to read up on EMC SourceOne platform and see what it can offer, I wonder if this will link in with Documentum amongst other things.

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Cnet.com

SAN FRANCISCO–Windows Server boss Bill Laing said in an interview Friday that the server version of Windows 7 will ship this calendar year.

Using a little bit of deduction, I’d say that means Windows 7 continues to be tracking ahead of schedule. Although Laing’s comments referred to Windows Server 2008 R2 and not to the desktop version, server products traditionally ship after desktop operating systems based on the same code base, owing to greater testing needs.

“We’ve really been executing,” Laing said, noting that although the R2 product is a relatively minor release for the server unit, it still packs more features than he would have expected a year and a half ago.

As was the case with Windows 7, Microsoft shipped a beta version of the server update in January, after sharing it with some early customers in December. The next version, a release candidate, is due soon. Laing wouldn’t say whether it would ship by next month, as is being speculated on the desktop side of things.

“I’m not sure yet,” Laing said. “It’s not far away, but we don’t have a final date yet.”

I’m genuinely looking forward to Windows 7, it will be interesting to see what it brings to the end user community, what new functionality and improved resilience can be delivered. That said, I hope it supports and builds upon the virtual desktop, we’ll have to see. I’m off to check it out.

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IT-Director.com

A fact of life is that the need for server and storage capacity just keeps growing, recession or not. If yours is a data centre (or cloud) in which raw compute power resides, you may shudder at your energy bills – or perhaps just fear that you may hit the power supply limits for your facility.

Any system solution that counters this in a sizable way should be welcomed. Hardware vendors, knowing this, have worked hard on improving energy efficiency – and labelling it ‘green’.

Enter CloudRack C2, developed and manufactured by Rackable Systems in the US (more of whom in a moment). This 46U high cabinet can carry a server density up to 1,280 x86 cores (AMD Opterons now and ready for energy efficient Intel Xeon Nehalems when available) – pretty lean. The company claims the C2 achieves 99% energy efficiency – so green (for which read operating cost savings).

This article talks about Rackable’s CloudRack C2 which sounds like a great platform for virtualization or hpc as we commoditize the physical server. I love the servers lacking fans (that should reduce failures and improve efficiency), as well as AC support and ability to operate at high temperatures.

If we could operate the data center (and the servers/infrastructure) at 35% Celcius, we could substantially reduce the power and operating costs of the data center which has to be a good thing for the end user community. There might be a premium in the support cost, but the energy savings should more than cover that, couple this with a hardware cycle of two/three years instead of four/five and you could reduce your operating costs and effectively ‘fix’ your running costs. I’m off to read up more.

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I was having a chat with a friend the other day about how things have changed only recently, it’s interesting to see how things progress.

He was telling me about 18 months ago the default standard at their organization was built around two main server types, there was the ‘standard’ and the ‘performance’ specification server.  In summary and not being too vendor/organizational specific:

Standard: (might be a web or batch server, even a domain controller)

• 2 processors
• Up to say 8GB RAM (newer servers might support more)
• At least four hard drives (two for Windows, two for Data)
• Two network ports

Performance: (might be for a batch/database or ESX host)

• 4 processors
• Up to 16GB RAM (newer servers might support more)
• Up to four hard drives (most data would be SAN attached)
• Many PCI slots to host network or fibre cards

More recently however, there has been a change a downsize if you wish. There’s been a change in the standard specification box from 3u (a DL380 let’s say) to a 1u rack mount or blade equivalent. The 1u server can support several of the small form factor drives, it will have typically two network ports (in case you need the second one for backups/clustering), they will have two multi core processors so can cope with typical workloads.

With this in mind, we might change the standard to a 1u box:

• 2 multi core processors
• 8GB RAM
• Local small form factor drives

There are of course exceptions to the rule (as we’d always expect), it’s just interesting to watch that just a few years ago colleagues were talking of the end of the 1u server, “not enough storage”, they’d say, “I need more than 2 pci slots” or more memory support – use a virtual machine.

The vendors seem to be catching up with this and making the 1u, not only more powerful, but scalable. But then are we not changing the nature of the server? Do I not just need a network attached memory and cpu device?

• As we virtualize, does the underlying tin need to worry about specifications?
• Do I not just need a box that I plug into a thing that makes it work?
• Do I not just move the virtual machines around the network as performance/business requirements require it?
• In essence does the number of virtual machines per server matter? Particularly in a world of commodity, where I can simply rack another 1u at low cost than provisioning high cost high value servers? It’ll depend on your strategy, platform and energy policies/constraints.

We’ll see what matters to the end user is that the newer 1u servers we’re seeing (and have seen) coming on stream are bringing more options in terms of performance and connectivity, whilst at the same time improving their management which has to be a good thing for the end user community.

Are the higher specification servers and blades being undermined? No, I think we’re just seeing a movement more to extremes as we see with the car market, the middle of the road market (products) need to justify how they add value, find their ‘niche’ and operate on that basis, not worry about the other markets. Concentrating on your core business what you do best and building on that is the way forward.

Let’s not forget, the 1u server might be fine for Janice’s real estate business where she needs an email server, somewhere to store some files and an internal web server. For Mike though, who needs to provide a remote office with a virtualization platform, to host their file server, a few application servers for Citrix, the 3u will live on. We have different servers, different vendors and platforms (x86/PowerPC/Sparc) for different markets and needs, you as an end user need to establish which ones work for you and your business.

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Forbes

IBM has received a seven-year, $184 million extension of its technology services contract with National Account Service Co. to help process insurance claims for Blue Cross and Blue Shield, the companies said on Thursday.

As part of the deal signed Tuesday, International Business Machines Corp. ( IBM – news – people ) will continue to provide the claims processor with data center services, including storage, server services and off-hour help desk support. In addition, IBM plans to upgrade NASCO’s mainframe system to boost its computing power and energy efficiency.

Well done to IBM, outsourcing elements of the IT infrastructure continues to deliver value for businesses, and can be a vehicle to achieve change or transformation, we’ll have to see how this goes.

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Computerworld

April 2, 2009 (CIO) It’s hard, in an economy that finds bottom and then wallows there, to say that a particular set of IT skills is in extremely high demand. Recruiters acknowledge that amide layoffs and slashed IT budgets skill areas designated “hot” may only be “less cold than others.”

Skills in virtualization-which is both a hot new technology and one that can save enterprises lots of money in data-center costs-seem to have overcome that faint praise, however, and become genuinely hot.

“If you look at what demand is out there and the cost savings you can achieve with [virtualization], that speaks volumes. That’s why it still gets the budget dollars approved for it,” according to Brian Gabrielson a regional vice president of Robert Half Technology, the IT-recruiting division of global contract-employment and recruiting giant Robert Half International (RHI).

An interesting article talking about the top 5 virtualization skills that are needed in the enterprise. I wonder if we wont see recruitment in the IT sector return as many organizations have reduced their IT support spend significantly, you can only do this for so long before revenue, before service becomes affected.

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PC World

An Apple online store is set to take preorders of new Xserve servers carrying Intel’s new Xeon chips, hinting at launch of the devices in the near future.

A notice on Apple’s Hong Kong online store is offering to take preorders of the Xserve based on Intel’s latest Xeon server chips. However, preorders cannot be placed as the link hasn’t been activated yet, and customization capabilities for the old Xserve products have been disabled.

“Preorder the new Xserve with Intel Xeon (Nehalem),” the Web page states.

Apple does not comment on future products, an Apple spokesperson said. It is unclear when the servers would be released, though enthusiast sites including AppleInsider have predicted availability in a few weeks.

The upcoming servers could carry quad-core chips from the Xeon 5500 and 3500 family, which Apple has already included in its Mac Pro workstations launched last month. Intel has said the Xeon chips are its fastest server chips to date, which can be cranked up to run at speeds of 3.46GHz.

Intel’s Nehalem microarchitecture improves system speed by cutting bottlenecks that plagued Intel’s earlier chips. In certain circumstances, the chips could double server performance while consuming less power compared to its predecessors.

I remain an avid fan of Apple computers, so it will be interesting to see what Apple have to offer with their new Xserve servers, I’m off to read up more.

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Maximum PC

Initial reactions to Windows 7 has been, for the most part, pretty positive, enough so that some have admitted to using the beta as their primary OS. The general consensus is that Windows 7 is what Vista should have been all along, but that doesn’t mean there won’t still be demand for XP when the new OS ships.

Citing a “source within Hewlett Packard,” AppleInsider says the OEM has been granted an extension to continue selling Windows XP on its business desktops, workstations, and notebooks instead of Windows 7 for another year. Microsoft appears to have been reluctant to grant the extension, reiterating that the nearly eight-year-old OS is on its last legs.

“It’s important to remind customers that Microsoft are still planning to retire XP Pro Mainstream support on April 14th 2009 and will only provide OS security updates beyond that date unless the customer has an Extended Hotfix Support contract. MS Extended Support for XP Pro ends on April 8th 2014,” the source was quoted as saying.

I’m looking forward to Windows 7, I’m genuinely excited about what innovations and improvements they have brought with this new operating system. I’m off to read up more, XP will be here to stay for a while, so many enterprises have committed to investing in it, and it’s still good enough for mainstream users (particularly in terms of system requirements to functionality).

I wonder if it will have any virtualization features?

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