One of the biggest challenges faced by IT departments today is the management and complexities associated with disparate systems within their datacenters. Additionally the constant economic pressures have only succeeded in magnifying these challenges as businesses face lower budgets and higher operational costs.
These conditions have led to a shift towards cloud environments. Successful move into a cloud infrastructure will require a cost efficient and tested virtualization solution that is easily managed, highly available, scalable and improves deployment timelines significantly. FlexPod from NetApp is one such revolutionary datacenter solution. Developed jointly in collaboration with VMware and Cisco, NetApp’s FlexPod is based on a shared, flexible infrastructure which can be easily scaled for a variety of application workloads, configured for server infrastructure, virtual desktop and cloud environments. Here in this article we will take a look at the key features of NetApp’s FlexPod.
FlexPod for VMware: Key Features
Cisco Validated Design – FlexPod is featured within several Cisco Validated Designs (CVD). CVDs solutions are system tested designs documented in a way that outlines consistent, streamlined, repeatable deployment methodology. Example CVD’s solutions include FlexPod for VMware, SAP, SharePoint and Hyper-V. FlexPod can be tweaked and modified to meet the workload and requirements of the current infrastructure, it is a scalable solution rather than a specific set of hardware.
Tunable Infrastructure in the Reference Configuration – FlexPod features Cisco UCS Blade servers, Nexus family switches and NetApp storage controllers. Although the base FlexPod features specific models such as the NetApp FAS 3210A storage controller, customers have the flexibility to swap components within FlexPod to meet their workload requirements.
Scale Up and Out Capabilities – As organizations grow and additional workloads need to be supported, FlexPod can be scaled out by adding additional racks or can be scaled up by upgrading individual components. The key to the scalability is that it is an extension of the existing FlexPod infrastructure and the entire infrastructure should be managed as a single unit.
These key features enable FlexPod to provide a highly scalable, unified packaged architecture with an unrivaled flexibility in the solutions it provides. It is important to remember that because FlexPod is a reference architecture, the potential use cases for FlexPod are endless and only limited by the imagination of the design engineer.
What’s your opinion? Do you think FlexPod will change the way infrastructure is implemented within the datacenter?
Tags: FlexPod
