News

News

• May 23, 2017 23 May'17

  Enterprise OpenStack adds users and supporters, but criticisms persist

  A lack of open source development support adds to enterprise OpenStack criticism, as the platform inches forward with traditional IT customers and partners.

• May 18, 2017 18 May'17

  IT pros see minor benefits in newest Dell EMC servers

  A new generation of Dell EMC servers, storage and hyper-converged, with only minor enhancements, made the combined companies' initial outing a low-key affair.

• May 11, 2017 11 May'17

  To drive business transition, IT leaders must first regain control

  As companies strive to modernize application delivery, a perfect storm of IT and business scenarios have led to unrealistic expectations across the board.

• May 10, 2017 10 May'17

  Unoriginal pricing model finds a place in the data center

  Flexible hardware pricing?  What took so long? Perhaps there were a few IT pros that wondered this when they first heard about the Cloud Flex Pay per use pricing that was introduced as a new buying ...

• May 10, 2017 10 May'17

  Containers, cloud, fast networking and IoT still top IT trends

  From containers and faster networking to IoT and edge computing, these trends continue to define the role of IT pros in future data centers and the skill sets they need to hone.

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• May 09, 2017 09 May'17

  HCI updates bring cloud-style pricing to the on-premises data center

  Enterprise IT teams can now buy data center hardware based on just what they use, rather than receive the one big bill that has long been a cornerstone of on-prem purchases.

• May 01, 2017 01 May'17

  Managed OpenStack private cloud gains support vs. roll-your-own

  An OpenStack private cloud managed as a service can simplify deployment and operation for enterprises and focus on the benefits of cloud computing, not Linux.

• April 20, 2017 20 Apr'17

  Flyover country: Making data center market growth great again

  Your data center provider is more likely than ever to have a southern drawl or Midwestern lilt. The Southeast, Southwest, and Midwest are among the fastest growing data center markets in the United ...

• April 18, 2017 18 Apr'17

  IT shops map journey from VMware Cloud Foundation to IBM Cloud, AWS

  More than 1,000 users have moved their VMware infrastructure to IBM's public cloud using Cloud Foundation, while others await a much publicized AWS partnership to go GA.

• April 14, 2017 14 Apr'17

  Hyper-converged systems will underpin hybrid cloud, says Dell EMC exec

  Enterprises will increasingly fill data centers with rack-scale hyper-converged infrastructure as the basis for hybrid clouds, says the CTO of Dell EMC's converged platforms division.

• March 27, 2017 27 Mar'17

  You did what? Blunders, boo-boos and bloopers from data center outages

  Data center outages at Delta Airlines and Amazon Web Services stole the headlines in recent months, but there's plenty of other outages at everyday enterprises that fly under the radar. IT pros ...

• March 27, 2017 27 Mar'17

  And the next sexy technology is….Blockchain?

  When I first noticed the line there was maybe a few dozen people in it. The number quickly swelled to 100 and then 200 or more, as the line snaked its way down the aisles of the vendor exhibition ...

• March 17, 2017 17 Mar'17

  Fortify IoT infrastructure now, even for simple deployments

  The IoT deployments in the enterprise today may not tax the current infrastructure, but it's not too soon to prep for the demands of tomorrow.

• March 15, 2017 15 Mar'17

  Cisco hyper-converged update spruces HyperFlex, raises HCI stakes

  As Cisco looks to soon be without SimpliVity as a hyper-converged infrastructure partner, it beefs up its HyperFlex product with coengineered software with Springpath.

• March 15, 2017 15 Mar'17

  One quantum leap for IBM, one small step for IT

  After cooking for more than three decades in its research laboratories, Big Blue has served up an appetizer of its quantum computing efforts, to give the IT world its first taste of what ...

• March 14, 2017 14 Mar'17

  Prepare for smart data center scenarios in IoT, colo

  Smart technologies can automate and simplify the data center -- but only if you prepare for their implementation. Learn how to transition smoothly from legacy hardware.

• March 06, 2017 06 Mar'17

  No vendor lock-in fear with converged infrastructure

  Converged and hyper-converged infrastructure is often built by one vendor. So, where's the corresponding vendor lock-in fear?

• February 24, 2017 24 Feb'17

  Azure Stack appliance choices widen, as pricing questions linger

  Azure Stack will have a fourth appliance option when it becomes generally available later this year, but questions about pricing continue to emerge.

• February 20, 2017 20 Feb'17

  RISC processors look to hold on to the SPARC, keep up the Power

  Cloud computing is built on the x86 processor, but don't forget RISC processors -- simple, yet powerful chips that still drive some of the data center's most important workloads.

• February 10, 2017 10 Feb'17

  Lessons learned from data center outages, but still a long trip ahead

  The hits keep on coming for the airline industry, with several more IT outages that have stranded angry passengers in recent months. Are there any new lessons for IT pros?

• January 27, 2017 27 Jan'17

  Dodge sneaky colocation costs by monitoring your bill

  Colocation fees can pile up if you're not savvy. Negotiate with your provider and predict the scale of your organization to avoid surprises on your next bill.

• January 20, 2017 20 Jan'17

  HPE-SimpliVity deal raises support, price and development questions

  With HPE's buy of No. 2 SimpliVity -- the first big deal in the HCI space -- IT pros see a more robust offering, but also higher prices and weaker support.

• January 19, 2017 19 Jan'17

  Converged infrastructure drop-off doesn't mean data center death

  Traditional converged infrastructure has been supplanted by hyper-converged infrastructure and cloud computing, but it remains a solid and useful platform.

• January 09, 2017 09 Jan'17

  Data rides boomerang in on-premises vs. cloud computing battle

  More technology companies and large enterprises find that cloud computing is not as cost-effective as hoped, and have moved at least one application back on premises.

• December 23, 2016 23 Dec'16

  OpenStack support lifecycle shines longer for mainstream enterprises

  Lengthened support lifecycles for the latest OpenStack offerings aim to avoid one of the potholes of OpenStack operations with more stability and reassurance for less Agile workloads.

• December 20, 2016 20 Dec'16

  For some, expanded hyper-converged server choices miss the mark

  Growing server choices in hyper-converged appliances give enterprise IT pros all sorts of options, but many are more focused on the software.

• December 07, 2016 07 Dec'16

  Telcos purge colocation data centers, open door to neutral connections

  Enterprise customers in Verizon and CenturyLink's colocation data centers should expect better cloud and network connection options -- but not upheaval -- after being sold in 2017.

• December 06, 2016 06 Dec'16

  IT slowly embraces composable infrastructure

  If there will be a way to make an enterprise data center as efficient and optimized as cloud computing, composable infrastructure seeks to fill that role.

• November 22, 2016 22 Nov'16

  OpenStack enterprise adoption still awaits full embrace

  OpenStack in the enterprise is more likely to see continued adoption via vendor distributions and managed services, not the raw code of big-name customers, such as PayPal.

• November 10, 2016 10 Nov'16

  IT organizations give nod to a free hypervisor option

  The lure of free can be the deciding factor for organizations evaluating which hypervisor best fits their needs, and help them escape mounting annual license fees.

• November 08, 2016 08 Nov'16

  Three new colocation market trends for IT pros to tap into

  Competition is surging in the colocation market, and providers are adding new features to differentiate. IT pros should look for new services around cloud connections, green energy and more.

• October 28, 2016 28 Oct'16

  New calculator seeks public vs. private cloud cost comparison

  In the quest to calculate public cloud costs versus private cloud costs, IT pros have a new asset to help them apply quantifiable data to find their answer.

• October 25, 2016 25 Oct'16

  2017 Impact Awards: Vote for the Best Converged/Hyper-Converged Product

  Vote here for the Best Converged/Hyper-Converged Product in the 2017 Impact Awards.

• October 21, 2016 21 Oct'16

  Sage advice: Ten cost-optimization strategies for enterprise IT

  Need to rein in IT costs? These cost-optimization strategies, from centralization to cloud services to BYOD, will turn IT and business leaders into gurus of efficiency.

• October 21, 2016 21 Oct'16

  Converged systems proliferation, consolidation will shape users' choices

  Industry watchers hash out the future of converged systems, the best use cases for enterprise workloads and how IT pros should plan ahead for changes in the market.

• October 20, 2016 20 Oct'16

  Dell EMC hyper-converged infrastructure power-up stirs new uses, users

  Adding Dell servers to its hyper-converged infrastructure lineup boosts scalability and reliability for more use cases, says Dell EMC, but some customers may not be easily swayed.

• October 17, 2016 17 Oct'16

  More RAM, new chips may open doors for hyper-converged infrastructure

  Greater memory and faster chips will better suit VMware's hyper-converged infrastructure for Tier 1 workloads, the company hopes, as its tries to outdo market-leading Nutanix.

• October 12, 2016 12 Oct'16

  In VMware vs. OpenStack debate, IT shops seek compromise with VIO

  IT shops comfortable with vSphere may be happier staying home when comparing VMware vs. OpenStack to put together legacy and next-generation applications.

• October 07, 2016 07 Oct'16

  Hyper-converged infrastructure watchers mull losses and layoffs

  So what if many top vendors in the hyper-converged infrastructure market aren't profitable? Customers mostly care whether the technology is useful for their data centers.

• September 30, 2016 30 Sep'16

  Customized converged infrastructure fills data center middle ground

  A new batch of converged infrastructure looks to deliver many of its benefits to IT pros while still offering customization for specific workloads.

• September 26, 2016 26 Sep'16

  VMs look to edge out gateways in push for useful IoT data

  Virtual machines can now run on the edge, near the things at the center of the internet of things, making use of multiple applications outside the data center.

• September 16, 2016 16 Sep'16

  Outside the box: Users find another way for hyper-convergence

  IT pros have found a way to save money and use existing hardware with software-only hyper-convergence, the lesser-known alternative to appliance-based HCI choices.

• September 12, 2016 12 Sep'16

  For colocation data center dating, there are new ways to make a match

  Making matches between enterprises and services inside a colocation facility is getting easier with tools that act like LinkedIn in the data center.

• September 09, 2016 09 Sep'16

  Bulky vs. slim: Dell EMC and HPE paths raise innovation questions

  Users mull a vastly different IT buying landscape, after Dell Technologies completed the largest technology deal in history, while HPE sells off another part of its business.

• September 08, 2016 08 Sep'16

  Dell acquisition plan leaves users hungry for details

  IT professionals hoping for a taste of what the combined Dell-EMC-VMware will serve up to them for new products and strategies, got a bowl of steam instead. In formally announcing the completion of ...

• August 24, 2016 24 Aug'16

  Hyper-convergence extends to new uses with all-flash options

  Flash storage has reached a crossroads, where lower prices and greater capacity have led a growing number of hyper-converged infrastructure products to include all-flash storage.

• August 18, 2016 18 Aug'16

  Containers and Kubernetes ease OpenStack lifecycle management pain

  OpenStack has turned to Docker containers to help simplify its lifecycle management, as it also works to find ways to run containers itself.

• August 12, 2016 12 Aug'16

  Delta outage raises backup data center, power questions

  Another outage at an airline data center offers yet another lesson about the need to fail over to a backup data center and bounce back quickly after a power problem.

• August 10, 2016 10 Aug'16

  New open standard seeks home in the enterprise data center rack

  If the Open Compute Project is too big and scary for your enterprise, a new open standard for data center hardware has emerged to appeal to data centers big and small.

• July 27, 2016 27 Jul'16

  One type of server is growing in today's enterprise data center

  The density and flexibility offered by blade servers make them increasingly popular for IT pros inside an enterprise data center.

• July 22, 2016 22 Jul'16

  Containers come to hyper-converged systems, but now what?

  For IT pros managing virtualized, bare-metal and containerized workloads in the data center, can hyper-converged infrastructure offer what's needed?

• July 19, 2016 19 Jul'16

  New DBMS products open the door for a once dormant market

  Start-ups are breathing new life into the DBMS market, as organizations look to manage unstructured data from social media, big data and the internet of things.

• July 08, 2016 08 Jul'16

  How composable infrastructure opens the door to infrastructure as code

  IT pros looking for on-premises hardware to help deliver DevOps may find it in composable infrastructure, which is starting to show up in enterprise data centers.

• July 08, 2016 08 Jul'16

  How HPE's The Machine could fuel hardware engines

  A new server architecture based around memory is still a work in progress, but IT pros and leaders at HPE see its value today coming from incremental advancements.

• June 29, 2016 29 Jun'16

  RHEL 8 promises relief from dependency hell, more integration

  With RHEL hitting platform maturity, Red Hat's future includes Microsoft integration, expanded management and a smaller footprint.

• June 29, 2016 29 Jun'16

  IT pros eye Photon OS as matchmaker for vSphere, containers

  IT pros see potential for VMware's Project Photon and the Photon OS to tie together cloud-native applications and existing VMware environments.

• June 28, 2016 28 Jun'16

  Admins, get ready for container-friendly VMware Photon

  VMware made its name virtualizing servers and later with other proprietary technology, but it's reaching out to developers with its container-friendly, open source Project Photon.

• June 24, 2016 24 Jun'16

  Dell software biz jettisoned to advance EMC buy, users' views mixed

  Handing off most of its software business to private equity firms is one more step toward Dell's mega-purchase of EMC, and it gives users both clarity and concerns.

• June 17, 2016 17 Jun'16

  HPE turns to Docker Engine to fuel server sales

  HPE has found a data center friend in Docker to ease container entry into the enterprise, but right now, it's a step too far for some IT shops.

• June 15, 2016 15 Jun'16

  Data center operations score new glasses with VMware buy

  Seeing the physical and virtual layers across the data center has been a herculean task that one company has spent the last two years tackling -- and now, it will be part of VMware.

• June 08, 2016 08 Jun'16

  Edge servers escape data center for emerging IoT scenarios

  Data analytics may be at the core of a data center, but HPE is the latest big infrastructure player to offer technology for processing data at the edge around the internet of things.

• May 27, 2016 27 May'16

  Delivering composable infrastructure holds SDDC key for HPE

  Running hard to catch up with competitors, HPE gets ready to deliver a new approach to help users realize their long-held vision for a software-defined data center.

• May 27, 2016 27 May'16

  Disaggregation unlocks big data infrastructure efficiency

  The server-storage mismatch is at the heart of management challenges with big data architecture and can create inefficiencies for hardware running Hadoop and Spark. A different take on disaggregation can help.

• May 20, 2016 20 May'16

  Steady as it goes, RHEL 6.8 brings new archiving and VPN tool

  The most common data center operating system gets its final 6.x updates with the addition of a local backup archiving tool before transitioning to just security and stability updates.

• May 12, 2016 12 May'16

  EMC's newest rack-scale hyper-converged runs without VMware

  VCE's hyper-converged in size large had forced you to build a private cloud using VMware -- until now.

• May 09, 2016 09 May'16

  Tech spending priorities to shift with DevOps transition

  IT organizations should get ready to cede some budgetary control to business units, as software -- and software developers -- become key agents of commerce.

• April 29, 2016 29 Apr'16

  Make the bed, enterprise OpenStack deployment is moving in

  A typical OpenStack deployment is still for 'net new' workloads outside of the world's largest enterprises, but some big names have started to show off their use of OpenStack.

• April 25, 2016 25 Apr'16

  Why some IT leaders aren't falling for edge data centers

  Buzzword bingo games these days typically include 'edge data centers,' but how much real interest is there among users?

• April 13, 2016 13 Apr'16

  Gauging whether hyper-converged vendors' ages matter

  Deciding between the new guy and the old standby has driven purchasing decisions for decades, but what do users think when it comes to hyper-converged infrastructure?

• April 08, 2016 08 Apr'16

  New arrivals seek to simplify OpenStack private clouds

  Building an OpenStack private cloud can be challenging, but new options aim to help enterprises do it without a headache.

• April 04, 2016 04 Apr'16

  Disaggregated server benefits lie in efficiency gains

  Disaggregated servers are unlikely to go 'boom' in the market the way hyper-convergence has but figure to grow at a more leisurely pace.

• April 04, 2016 04 Apr'16

  IT operations pros contend with DevOps culture

  Plenty of tools exist to ease the technical challenges of DevOps, but you can't abstract away or automate cultural requirements like teamwork and trust.

• March 28, 2016 28 Mar'16

  Mainframe programmers can be young, cool and relevant

  When a 47-year-old mainframe programmer is one of the youngest in his department, it's clear more efforts are needed to attract young IT pros to careers in mainframes.

• March 18, 2016 18 Mar'16

  New hyper-convergence entrants seek a spot in enterprise IT

  Hyper-convergence can simplify IT operations by bringing together compute, storage and networking hardware with virtualization and management platforms, but it must break out of limited uses.

• March 16, 2016 16 Mar'16

  Assimilate converged IT infrastructure into the data center

  With the hype around converged and hyper-converged IT infrastructure, resistance seems futile. While your IT organization will likely be a mix of converged, dedicated and cloud-based resources, convergence is moving into new areas.

• March 14, 2016 14 Mar'16

  Big-name vendors lace gloves, box back at white box servers

  Top-tier vendors are speaking up, hoping to compete with bare-bones white box servers that are increasingly popular with cloud service providers.

• March 07, 2016 07 Mar'16

  New hyper-converged buyers expected to enter the game in 2016

  Hyper-converged infrastructure is set to replace some traditional hardware in the data center during the coming year, if enterprises can overcome organizational and budget worries.

• February 26, 2016 26 Feb'16

  Hybrid cloud benefits outweigh cons, say IBM customers

  The benefits of a hybrid cloud transition outweigh complex integration challenges, according to IBM execs, users and industry watchers at the company's annual InterConnect event.

• February 18, 2016 18 Feb'16

  Buyout could give stagnant DCIM tools market a boost

  Two vendors in the highly competitive DCIM market will combine through a buyout to offer an integrated platform with monitoring and asset management functions.

• February 18, 2016 18 Feb'16

  Privacy, power concerns drive Canadian data center growth

  One U.S. city has more data center space than all of Canada, but some data centers are being lured up to the 'True North' by inexpensive power and privacy concerns in the U.S.

• February 17, 2016 17 Feb'16

  What to expect when Dell acquires EMC

  The Dell-EMC merger matters to a lot of enterprise IT organizations, whether it's the storage they buy, their plan for SDN, management software integration or even converged infrastructure choices.

• February 17, 2016 17 Feb'16

  Server SSDs open up storage possibilities in data centers

  We've reached a point where it's easy to justify equipping servers with SSDs: the performance gains they offer enable new workloads, and improve end-user satisfaction with response time and run time. In many cases, SSDs pay for themselves by ...

• February 12, 2016 12 Feb'16

  President: We're moving VCE converged infrastructure up the stack

  IT pros increasingly want to buy infrastructure and not build it, says president of VCE Chad Sakac, as he outlines plans for the company's converged infrastructure products.

• February 05, 2016 05 Feb'16

  Life beyond Vblock: VCE repositions as EMC's new converged division

  The maker of the Vblock, VCE, is securing its role within the EMC Federation after the Dell-EMC merger as a converged platform division with new offerings in the works.

• February 03, 2016 03 Feb'16

  OCP making friends outside the Facebook data center

  The Open Compute Project is like buying supermarket store brands -- you still get what you want without the high price in your data center.

• January 29, 2016 29 Jan'16

  Minute by minute, data center outage costs stack up

  A study pinpoints the cost of a data center outage and lends insight into the causes behind outages at more than 60 data centers in the past year.

• January 26, 2016 26 Jan'16

  Colocation and cloud providers experience outage woes

  High profile outages of cloud infrastructure in 2015 still have some businesses spooked, even though cloud providers increased the resiliency of their offerings.

• January 18, 2016 18 Jan'16

  JetBlue, Verizon data center downtime raises DR, UPS questions

  A power failure at a Verizon data center knocked out JetBlue's digital infrastructure for several hours, giving IT pros plenty to consider when thinking about uptime.

• January 15, 2016 15 Jan'16

  Server market share shows enterprise buyers aren't forgotten

  If there was concern that interest in the server market was waning among IT pros in a software-dominated world, the latest batch of analyst reports should ease those worries.

• January 12, 2016 12 Jan'16

  Innovation, automation keep down outsourced data center bills

  Renewals for data center outsourcing deals during the past year reveal a drop in prices, thanks to increases in automation, and server and storage demand.

• January 08, 2016 08 Jan'16

  Trip back to earth solves a cloud vs. data center debate

  When the leader in online deals started to hit the big time, the company realized cloud computing was no longer its best option and began to move into its own data center space.

• January 07, 2016 07 Jan'16

  Containers transform steel mill into modular data center

  Stacking containers inside a former steel mill creates a new modularly designed data center with abundant power.

• December 31, 2015 31 Dec'15

  Data center capacity planning gets visual with latest buyout

  The merger of TeamQuest and PureShare adds a new visual component to data center capacity planning and tools to present data center needs to the C-suite.

• December 30, 2015 30 Dec'15

  The 10 biggest data center news stories of 2015

  Data center teams modernized and adapted throughout 2015, with help -- and hindrance -- from major changes in the IT industry, which ranged from new job demands to transitions among providers.

• December 22, 2015 22 Dec'15

  Wall Street's grip on IT providers a 'new reality'

  The effect of activist investors and leveraged buyouts on IT providers is something that can be advantageous in IT buying decisions.

• December 22, 2015 22 Dec'15

  Data center experts predict 2016 IT trends

  Software-defined everything, security, IoT, APIs and other technologies top our experts' predictions for 2016 data center trends.

• December 15, 2015 15 Dec'15

  Eight emerging data center trends to follow in 2016

  Data center facilities are undergoing tremendous change, with trends such as open standards and DCIM catching on, and emerging technologies pushing the limits of density and power.

• December 11, 2015 11 Dec'15

  Simpler management motivates Ethernet SAN investments

  Blending LAN and SAN networks cuts a lot of management headaches -- and miles of cable -- out of the data center.

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  Dell Quest, SonicWall users face another acquisition deal

  SonicWall and Quest Software users, who endured Dell's acquisition three years ago, face more uncertainty, as Dell reportedly considers the sale of those companies to reduce debt.

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  Is your dream geek gift on the list?

  Each year, SearchDataCenter ushers in the holiday season with a geek gift guide by Beth Pariseau, who enjoys a brief break from breaking stories about AWS public cloud to tell you about what to ...