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Super Micro is releasing a 1u server featuring two GPUs these might be great for those graphics/hpc solutions where the application code can be optimized to fully utilize the GPUs to process workloads. I’m off to read up more.

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Check out this white paper from blade.org which is talking about consolidation and workload optimization. It’s always great to see what solutions and best practices different groups are talking about.

The more as vendors/service providers we do in the discussion of ideas, best practices and concepts, the more we can illustrate how to deploy the technology ‘in the real world’, understanding that the reason projects fail are often not technical, they can be process or user perception. That it didn’t deliver what it said it would do on the tin so to speak.

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It’s great to see different vendors investing in Green technology, only with investment can we create new technologies, best practice and ideas in providing our energy requirements for the future in an environmentally and financially affordable way. 

I wonder if we will see any further developments in the data center both in terms of air flow, power usage and the way we manage and distribute loads. Anything more on the lights out data center? We’ll see, I’m off to check out more.

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There’s an interesting article in the Guardian talking about Internet providers reducing the carbon footprint of their data centers and it’s right. ISP’s can attack this in several ways, both in terms of the data center air flow and power, as well as looking at the hardware and software configuration of their systems. Whether it’s looking at cheaper commodity servers/desktops, energy efficient processors or larger high volume systems will depend on your application/service adaptability to that platform.

We need though to manage this wealth of information, of service and functionality with the old issue of revenue, with free email, free facebook and youtube, there is only so much investment that can be economically invested to deliver ‘Green’ data centers, we can look at virtualization also, but there again are limits to what can be delivered as the cost of power increases and as we need to declare the carbon footprint of our IT or business.

With this in mind does this mean a change of the ‘free’ services online or the need for new technologies, new best practice and new ways of doing things? In essence, are we not approaching the need for the next generation:

• Application – which is compartmentalized and can run on anything?
• Infrastructure – which is adaptable and scales in line with your constraints – power/heat/application?
• Data Center – which can change air flow and power in line with application or business requirements?

In essence, do we not need to further examine and see IT the end product as a service, and start moving it around the data center, the enterprise, the world so to speak in line with economic, environmental or legislative requirements? HP can give me the best data center in terms of cost and power, fine we’ll move there until the next provider can do the same or give me a better deal?

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There’s an interesting post over at IT Skeptic talking about Cloud Computing and how it will fit within the enterprise, do check it out. I remain a fan of the concept, though do agree in terms of how we can get cloud to work in the enterprise. Oh there’s no doubt for some applications or services, outsourcing the hosting or service can make sense, but there remain a few issues around the outsourcing model which we’ve discussed before, (I’ll go over them in a minute), but the key issue remains with cloud is investment, industrial computing and ownership.

For the enterprises issues over ownership of data, of data security, privacy, when I allocate workload to the external cloud (email/application code for processing) are the disks securely wiped? Who owns the server, is it me? Will Mike from another business be able to access that server, that data, and what is the cost per cpu hour or transaction? The old issue remains of internal cross charging and hidden fees. Do you as an application guy know the true cost of your application? Do you not just pay fixed IT costs, and then the cost of your staff? With that in mind how prepared to buy-in compute resources will I be if I actually have to pay that true cost? Remember, an application or infrastructure cost can easily be ‘hidden’ within total costs. I don’t make HR liable for extra hardware support cost because their servers are older than Facilities. If HR’s database is failing more regularly, they do not typically face increased support cost, on-call is typically part of shared IT cost as is monitoring.

Don’t get me wrong, I can see real opportunities in the SME markets, whether it’s an email server, web farm or application which I can download from the internet and not worry about the licensing, the server costs, the backups and everything else, just pay what you use – googlemail is the prime example. I wonder though if we might see this in the virtualization space?

Demand for cloud, whether it will work for you is going to typically depend on:

• Data sensitivity
• Understanding your requirements and internal costs
• Portability and suitability of application code/feeds to cloud
• Internal barriers to the platform – technical/political barriers to success – the cost of licenses internally, the ability to absorb cost, and to over-rule IT – you can’t do that as easily with a service provider. The “That’s an IT cost”

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Super Micro announced that they’re launching their 4-watt and 8-watt based Server Building Block solutions. The servers are set to be energy efficient, quiet and at the same time provide the necesary storage and network flexibility that might be needed by the platform. Developing a server based on the Atom could be an ideal solution for those specific roles/environments, where I might want a print server, email or file server where performance is not as important as energy efficiency and affordability. They do sound cool, and the more options we have in the server space, the more we can find the right solution to meet different needs and user communities, virtualization I can hear many say is the answer, and they’re right on the whole. But the demand for that stand alone server or ‘mini’ server to perform a specific role remains, an environment where I might only have one server will continue, remember the associated software/licensing and support costs. The concept of comfort zone, buying a server with Windows on it, is only two steps away from a pc, moving to a virtual world might seem that bit further away from what I know.

Regardless, may we continue to reach out to small businesses, continue innovating new solutions and platforms based on hardware, software and cloud computing – whatever works.

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NetApp has been added to the Global Green 100 List for 2009 by the Uptime Institute for critical computing environment reliability and energy efficiency. It’s great to see NetApp getting recognition for their work in the reliability and energy efficiency space, it’s also great to discuss such issues not only in terms of cost and environmental impact but in terms of business empowerment and delivery.

The more we dicuss Green IT within the realms of business empowerment, how an energy efficient solution might not only meet or exceed your requirements, but that it might do so in a way that  creates a sustainable and cost/operation efficient platform for your business.  That I have an energy efficient storage platform is great, that the platform can also meet my storage or business requirements, deliver the functionality and the reliability can be just as important if not more so. Well done to NetApp for the recognition.

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After some excitement a while back, when Oracle agreed to buy Sun, they’ve just announced that they are purchasing Virtual Iron. This is very cool for Oracle, bringing new opportunities for revenue and in solutions based on Oracle’s range of products. Could we have a virtualization platform that is optimized for Oracle as a database platform and optimized for Sun hardware?

It will be interesting to see the range of solutions and products that result from this announcement and if this might lead to further innovation or competition in the virtualization space?

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Is there a reason we’re not using My SQL in the enterprise as much as we could do?

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Is it virtual desktop, or google apps that SME’s need?

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