Achieving simplicity is a constant battle within data centers, because complexity causes major problems and unnecessary work for IT teams and the systems they manage. Consider the domino effect that can happen when one part of the environment requires upstream or downstream upgrades. The time it takes to investigate and plan these upgrades leads to the classic keeping the lights on struggle that prevents many companies from truly using IT to innovate for the business. To tame complexity, many are turning to hyperconverged solutions.
Complexity wastes time and resources
In legacy environments, with so many different types of systems needing to interact with each other to accomplish business objectives, the potential for error goes up considerably. The higher chance of failure is made worse by the fact that so many interactions can make diagnosing the failure even more difficult. To make things worse, if the systems are from different vendors there is a real potential of the different vendors pointing fingers at one another.
People time isnโt the only wasted resource when considering complexity. With so many different applications and devices, data gets moved around and reprocessed a lot in todayโs data center. The result is stranded CPU, network, and disk capabilities that cannot be utilized.
Complexity impedes disaster recovery
If thereโs one situation where complexity is least desirable, it would be during disaster recovery. Any successful recovery is going to be based on a solid plan, which can be very time consuming in a convoluted environment. Even with solid planning, bringing a companyโs IT assets back to service after a disaster of any size can be a daunting task when there are many different individual components.
At best, the web of interacting systems, even in a small environment, will require significant time to bring up all components in the proper order and ensure theyโre working together appropriately. At worst, tracking down issues in a complex environment amongst the high stress of a disaster will cause compounded problems and significant loss of data availability.
Disparate systems cause complexity
Unfortunately, this level of complexity has slowly made its way into daily IT routines. The daily demands on IT staff to do more with less doesnโt always allow a holistic approach to solutions. The result is products that are brought in to solve a single pain point, often a gap in another productโs functionality, which are implemented and often ignored until something critical needs to be dealt with.
This approach to building an IT infrastructure creates complexity and introduces a lot of inefficiency for both the people and infrastructure resources. For example, many systems are now using deduplication, but few systems speak the same deduplication language, which means the data needs to be taken in and out of an efficient state every time it goes from system to system.
HPE SimpliVity takes a holistic approach
Appropriately managing data introduces efficiency and removes complexity, resulting in a simpler data center. Data goes through a common lifecycle, and many environments have a specific products that manage data at each stage, thus requiring the processing and bandwidth to move that data across infrastructure. Taking a holistic approach to this lifecycle and maintaining the data in a single system has the potential to drastically reduce the complexity IT is currently dealing with. Combining this approach with concepts of modern data efficiency like deduplication and compression could lead to even more advantages for a business.
This is the approach HPE SimpliVity powered by Intelยฎ uses to meet the goal to simplify hybrid IT. By deduplicating and compressing all data at inception and maintaining it in this state through the entire life-cycle of that data, HPE SimpliVity is able to be more efficient with the data and remove much of the complexity from customer data centers. The results can be wide ranging and directly impact the bottom line, as this Forrester study proves.
To learn more about how HPE SimpliVity creates a simpler data center, and how deduplication and compression make data as efficient as possible, download this whitepaper: The technology enabling HPE SimpliVity data efficiency
Brian
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brianknudtson
A former administrator, implementation engineer, and solutions architect focusing on virtual infrastructures, I now find myself learning about all aspects of enterprise infrastructure and communicating that to coworkers, prospects, customers, influencers, and analysts. Particular focus on HPE SimpliVity today.
