Blog Series: About IT, by Ed Turetzky
There is a lot of discussion today about the hyper-convergence of processing power, storage capacity and network. Most of the discussion has been around a couple of newcomers in Nutanix and Simplivity that provide a data center in a box.
Both of these vendors started with using commodity x86 chips under the covers, but their own purpose built hardware. This included both processors and (only) internal storage, providing a nice solution that was quick to implement. The only catch was that you had to use only their hardware in the solution.
Many customers look at the hyper-converged capabilities and see that there is a lot of functionality particularly around storage. This includes backup, remote replication and deduplication/compression. All of this runs on the x86 hardware that composes your virtualized environment. Unfortunately, these advanced functions will only work on the storage resources that are part of the hardware solution. This is true even today as both Nutanix and Simplivity are moving from their original proprietary hardware packages to partner with leading x86 vendors and offer their solution on standard hardware.
Hyper-convergence can be a benefit for many customers. However, few are ready to replace their existing storage and processor investments with a hardware based hyper-converged solution. There are software based products, like DataCore, that provide the benefits of hyper-converged functionality while being able to utilize your existing processor and storage assets. This allows you, the customer, to have hyper-convergence on your terms.
Analyst firm IDC said it considers hyper-converged infrastructure to be a fast-growing, fast-changing emerging market. “IDC expects that market forces such (as) fierce competition and buyer demand will accelerate the metamorphosis of this market into a mature market with only a few dominant vendors. … In all likelihood, the only survivors in this market may be vendors with robust partner ecosystems and/or vendors with commercial variants of open source platforms,” IDC reported.
Flagship can assist you in determining whether hyper-convergence will benefit your organization and if so, which flavor is best for you. Flagship has knowledge of and experience with various hyper-converged alternatives, making us well positioned to be your trusted advisor.
Schedule a consultation today to see if hyper-converged solutions are right for your business.
If you liked this blog, you might also like: Are Storage Arrays Dead?
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