MICROSERVERS AND CONSOLIDATION

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MICROSERVER HIGH-VALUE SCENARIO

One Use Case Scenario Where MicroServers and Solar Power Can Make a Real Difference For Your Business.

MICROSERVERS AND CONSOLIDATION

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MAXED-OUT DATA CENTERS In many studies of where IT is going to spend money in 2012 and 2013, Server

Consolidation is still at, or near, the top of the list as a strategic priority. However, many

organizations are at an impasse with how to consolidate without first increasing the

number of servers they have in the data center. Some organizations simply do not have the

room, electricity or cooling to put in more servers prior to the consolidation effort. It is

something of a check mate, where any move on premises is problematic. Further, the

backup and recovery environment requires additional new servers, networking and

storage to provide adequate redundancy of the proposed new consolidated environment.

Many organizations keep the consolidation perpetually on hold because of these vexing

issues.

ENTER MICROSERVERS The MicroServer market today is mainly characterized by MicroServers at the low end for

entry-level server computing, and by highly proprietary MicroServers at the high end for

HyperScale computing. Large vendors that make server systems seem unwilling to

produce a product that cannibalizes their existing mid-range server revenue stream. So,

you see very few compact, powerful and energy efficient MicroServers that are low cost

and run traditional server workloads. One exception is the US Micro CriKit MicroServer

http://www.crikit.info . It uses Intel Xeon Processors, healthy amounts of memory and

Solid State Disk Drives to achieve a degree of high capacity that can’t be accomplished

with the current breed of low end, entry-level MicroServers. The CriKit MicroServer is at

the junction of small, powerful and low wattage. It is this combination that makes it an

excellent candidate for the consolidation scenario where the IT environment has few

options because of constrained space and power/cooling resources.

CRIKIT MICROSERVER A CriKit MicroServer is a new entry into the MicroServer space. It uses a 64 Bit Intel Xeon

Processor with 4 cores and 8 threads, up to 32 GB of RAM and can be configured with one

or two 2.5 inch hard drives that operate at 6 Gb/Sec, SATA III Speeds. Further, they draw

less than 100 Watts at peak and about .8 amps. This low power consumption means they

generate minimal heat while providing significant computing power.

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Further, because of the low power consumption, they can be run directly from a Solar

Panel system.

THE SOLUTION You may have already figured out that I am advocating putting a Solar Panel system in the

parking lot to provide the electricity to the CriKit MicroServers to accelerate the

consolidation efforts. The MicroServer is the size of a book so no rack space is required

and it can be cooled by normal Air Conditioning. Because you have already done an

inventory of your server systems and their workloads, you select the smaller, older

servers first – those with 1 or 2 processors and minimal RAM – and perform a physical to

virtual conversion on them and start running the virtual machines on the CriKit

MicroServers. A single CriKit MicroServer can easily run 3 virtualized servers that only

had 4 GB of memory and a single processor. Once you have the workloads on the

MicroServer, you can remove the old servers and install the newer server that you wish to

permanently consolidate onto. Then, just move the virtual machines from the

MicroServers to the new server and you are ready to test the environment. You can easily

repeat the process as many times as you need and do it without being rushed so you can

test more thoroughly. You may even discover that the entire computing environment can

be run via Solar Power and MicroServers, but those are subjects for another paper.

SUMMARY Compact, powerful and low-wattage MicroServers like the US Micro, CriKit MicroServer,

are allowing organizations to find unique solutions to their consolidation, cost-cutting and

carbon footprint reduction efforts. The use of Solar Power and low-wattage MicroServers

provides organizations with cost-effective and versatile solutions across a broad

spectrum of use cases, in addition to server and workload consolidation.

For More Information – http://www.crikit.info

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Company Information

US Micro PC

Bellevue, WA

Tel 800-874-5505

http://www.usmicro.com