SilverBack Migration Solutions Datacenter Blog

Datacenter Professionals Network Overview

Ken Carroll ofthe Datacenter Professionals Network produced a nice video overview of the Network, and the current functionality of the website. It is about 9 and a half minutes long, but provides a solid overview of the benefits of joining.

 

 

Oh, and notice the Silverback banner...front and center...  :-)

 

Ken

Extreme Makeover - Server Room Edition

So, here I am, watching YouTube videos of various conference presentations and I noticed this rather old video come across the recommended videos stream.

Note, it is rather odd...kinda long...but totally hilarious!

If you have 5 minutes of spare time that you don't necessarily want to get back...check it out!

 

SAS 70 Type II datacenter in Sacramento, CA

I am happy to announce that iStreet has completed their SAS 70 Type II audit!

Mark Richter is a good friend of mine, and I am quite pleased to see that he as taken iStreet's co-location facility to the next level!!

On a quick side note, I have been made aware of an upcoming promotion that iStreet is offering: 

* 1/4 Rack Space (11U)
* 5 Mgbs Unlimited Burst Bandwidth
* 8 AMPs of Power

for $499.00 a month!!

Feel free to contact their sales team directly, and mention offer code: sback609 for this special pricing!

 

 

 

The importance of Data Centers according to the NYT Magazine

You may not think about it every day, but you definately use data centers on a daily basis...almost everyone does!

This article, technically in Sunday's edition of the New York Times Magazine, explains this fact quite well. Tom Vanderbuilt writes about a few of the things he does online, and where data centers play a key role.

It is an exciting look into an industry that is invisible to many people, and shows just how important the internet is to our society...and those that know, are all to familiar with what it takes to keep that machine running!

Several key people are quoted in this article, including Rich Miller of Data Center Knowledge. 

 

 

Free Whitepaper - Benefits of Outsourced Managed Services for Data Center Hosting

Don Small, a 20 year veteran in IT and Operations brings us his insight to the Managed Services realm, including those provided by managed hosting companies and by outsourced managed service providers.

This whitepaper provides the data you need to make decisions like: 

• What services can I outsource to a managed services company?
  

• What are some immediate benefits to outsourcing? Long term benefits? 
  

• Is using a managed services provider cost effective for my organization?
  

Please click here to go to the download page and check out this fantastic whitepaper!

 

Join the Silverback Migration Solutions Fan Club on LinkedIN!

ATTENTION Data Center Professionals! 

I have found that our customers, vendors, and friends are a wealth of knowledge about all aspects of data centers. Whether it is data center design, data center power, co-location layout, colo facility selection, data center relocations (of course) and a ton of other topics; the Silverback Migration Solutions Fan Club on LinkedIN is a fantastic place to find information.

Please feel free to join now by going to the Silverback Fan Club on LinkedIN and sign up! 

 

Data Center Training – Core Requirements?

I am involved in a group called the "Data Center and IT Ops Education Committee" which is currently being run by a gentleman by the name of Randy Ortiz. Randy is diligently working with several organizations, including Data Center Pulse to help lay the framework for data center education, training and certification.

Recently, Randy put out a survey that I participated in which asked a few key questions. Without going into details about the questionaire, a solid theme involved the types of training and education should be required by data center professionals.

In my opinion, "certified" data center professionals should have significant knowledge in several areas that are key to the design, creation, and maintenance of a data center facility, no matter the size. Data centers are more than just a room full of servers and network gear. The proper design, build and maintenance of a data center requires input from departments that historically have had very little reason to communicate. IT and Operations have always been responsible for the server and network equipment, while facilities has been responsible for the building. Each of those groups has historically operated in a silo, without giving or requesting input from other groups. Today's data centers are a new breed of environment that requires these silos to be broken down and each of these groups to "play nice" with each other.

"Certified" Data Center professionals should be the bridge between these groups. Let the Operations and IT organizations stay inside their equipment, and let the facilities groups maintain the facility itself. Data Center professionals should have the appropriate knowledge to communicate with all of the above mentioned organizations and act as translators when necessary to get the appropriate requirements fulfilled.

Effective data center professionals in today's market, certified or not, have knowledge in at least the following areas: power distribution and allocation, thermo dynamics, and infrastructure cabling. Those 3 concepts are key to the effective design, build and maintenance of a data center facility, no matter the size. While I agree that there are other skillsets not mentioned here, I think these are the top 3.

Randy...I urge you to push for standardized training and education in these 3 areas.

I am very open to comments, questions and input...as I am sure Randy is as well! Feel free to comment on this blog, or in the LinkedIN group "Data Center & IT Ops Education Committee".

What are the top 5 considerations when picking a new co-location facility?

I am often asked for recommendations for co-location facilities, and I always respond with "What is important to you in a co-lo?" and I have not gotten the same answer twice.

So, I now put it out there, what are the Top 5 considerations when picking a new co-lo?

 

If I were to answer, I would say:

5. Remote Hands Services - There is nothing worse than dispatching a Senior Sys Admin to reboot a machine at 2:00am because there is nobody at the co-lo.

4. Growth Potential - Nobody assumes they are going to stay in a 4 rack cage forever. Is it possible to get contiguous space? If not, how far apart are the available spaces? If I take non-contiguous space, are the cross connects free?

3. Available Power - There is nothing worse than having rack space left, but no power to turn anything on.

2. Reliability - What is the site's uptime record? When was the last failure? How many customers did it affect? What is the sites redundancy N+1, N+2, S+S?

1. Location - Location is important for a slew of reasons, disaster zones, ease of travel, local talent pool, etc. You may chose to keep your data close to your office, close to your customer base, or off in the boonies...there is no hard and fast rule for where your data needs to live, it's all customer specific.

Now, keep in mind this is a rather generic list. Some companies may not need Remote Hands because they have dedicated staff for such functions; while other companies may require SAS70 or similar reporting or compliance items. What are your top 5?

Data Center data replication hardware that’s Fire, Bomb, Blast, Water Proof…

Let's play the pretend game. Let's pretend there is a catastrophic disaster that causes your primary data center to become a pile of rubble. Would a disaster of that magnitude cripple your entire company?

Data loss is a real problem. Look at Ma.gnolia, they had significant data loss problems, and their facility wasn't even on fire or under water!

I was recently introduced to a company called Axxana that makes a product called the Axxana Phoenix System. Their device is literally bomb proof. Fire proof. Submersible to 30′ underwater; and can take a direct hit of a pointed 500lb rod from 10 feet away. This device can withstand 40 G of shock and sit in a 2000 degree fire for an hour...all while transmitting your data via a cellular network to your backup site.

This may sound like overkill, but if this device were located in any of the buildings that have been hit by terrorists in the last 30 years (9/11, Oklahoma City, etc...) that data would have continued to transmit, sync, and reduced the residual damage caused by catastrophes.

Feel free to check them out on the web at www.axxana.com, or contact our sales team for an introduction.

Container based computing – How is this going to work, really?

With cloud computing being at the forefront of everyone's mind, I am curious how Container Based Computing will play out in 2009. For those that live under mossy rocks, container based computing is the method of building mini, self contained datacenters inside standard sized shipping containers.

Companies like Rackable Systems, Dell, Sun, and a handful of others are moving quickly and decisively towards Container Based Computing as core product offerings. Customers like Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, and Stanford University are already using containers in their production environments. In fact, it is no secret Microsoft plans on using several hundred containers in their Chicago datacenter. That said, I expect Container Based Computing to get very large, very fast.

I heard recently that Microsoft is considering a full container as a single asset. This change in methodology is striking for a few different reasons. A container can hold several hundred servers, network devices, etc. If Microsoft (or any company) starts considering that as a single asset, what happens when 1, 2, 20, etc of those devices fail? If it is a single asset, do they retire the entire container? Or is it like a memory swap in a standard server; just open the box, replace what's bad and keep moving forward?

Also, what is this going to do to conventional datacenters? If you can functionally build a datacenter in the middle of a field, just by laying a concrete or asphalt slab, and building a perimeter fence...how will that affect datacenters that currently host enterprise level customers? If Facebook were to consolidate facilities into containers and host them in a cornfield in Iowa, what happens to all of the space they occupy on both coasts? Ebay, Salesforce, MySpace, same question.

The datacenter market is very tight, even in the current economy, studies have said the cost of datacenter space will remain where it is (best case), if not go up dramatically (likely) in 2009. With companies halting construction on large scale datacenter builds, thus limiting supply; and companies moving into the cloud, thus increasing demand for large service providers. I can see a quick shift into containers and cornfields.

I don't want to get too far into the cascading effect that could have on the datacenter industry as a whole. It certainly would affect service providers (Silverback included), but it would also affect existing datacenter and co-location companies. If 365 Main, Terremark, Equinix, Savvis, etc lost half of their large customers (30+ racks) to containers. That would free up a whole bunch of co-location floor space, and the all important metric...power.

Again, I am not going to cascade that, but you can start to imagine where that could lead, and depending on your mood, that could be a really good thing...or a really bad thing. I guess what I am saying here is...there are too many unanswered questions with regard to Container Based Computing to truly identify how it is going to impact the datacenter industry as a whole. But it certainly will make an impact, and I can't wait to see how this all plays out!