There has been a lot of noise about hyperconvergence in the past months, but what does it really mean and how can IT departments benefit from this? In the following Q&A with Networks Asia, Matt Oostveen, Chief Technology Officer, APJ, VCE explains the nature of benefits of hyperconvergence.
WHAT DOES HYPERCONVERGENCE MEAN EXACTLY?
Hyperconvergence is a solution that integrates virtualization, compute, storage and data protection into one system, with a single point of support. This is in contrast to traditional integrated platforms and systems in which autonomous compute, storage, and networking systems are integrated at the factory by the vendor or resellers.
Hyperconverged systems collapse core storage, compute and networking functions into a single software solution or appliance. The result is a simple, easy-to-manage solution that also increases business agility and lowers risks.
Hyperconverged infrastructure is well-suited for today’s data centers as it gives businesses the ability to set up a fully virtualized software-defined environment easily and quickly. This ability in turn allows businesses to shorten the innovation cycle as IT services can be provisioned to match the speed of business.
WHAT IF I NEED MORE COMPUTE BUT NOT MORE STORAGE (AND VICE VERSA)? HOW IS DATA RESILIENCY AND PROTECTION ACHIEVED? CAN THE SOLUTION BE SCALED DOWN AS WELL AS BEING SCALED UP AND IF SO CAN IT BE DONE NON-DISRUPTIVELY?
Hyperconverged systems give customers maximum flexibility in managing their environment. Take Vxrail for instance.
If a customer’s workload is compute intensive, they can add VxRail systems with a large core count (28 in the all flash version) but with minimal storage installed. On the other hand, some customers require more storage. In this case there are three options. The first is to configure additional appliances with low core counts and large storage configurations. Should they require even more, it is possible to connect external storage to the VxRail using the network protocols. The third method is through the utilization of the Cloud Array functionality that allows customers to connect to public cloud storage options such as Azure and AWS.
To ensure data resiliency and protection, VxRail Appliances come fully loaded with integrated EMC mission-critical data services including replication, backup and cloud tiering at no additional charge.
HOW DO I MIGRATE FROM MY LEGACY INFRASTRUCTURE TO HYPERCONVERGED INFRASTRUCTURE? PURCHASING AND ACQUISITION. LOCAL PARTNER, EASE OF ACQUISITION, INITIAL UNITS OR QUANTITY REQUIRED, COST ALIGNMENT TO CONSUMPTION AND UTILIZATION, PURCHASE ON DEMAND, PAY AS YOU GROW, FLEXIBILITY TO CHANGE COMPONENTS OR MIX AND MATCH COMPONENTS AFTER INITIAL PURCHASE BASED ON BUSINESS OR TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS.
In most cases, infrastructure strategy should follow the workload, so our advice is for customers looking to migrate to analyze their data and application environment before making decisions on the underlying infrastructure.
VxRail allows companies to start small and scale large. The starting point is a single appliance, and as customer needs grow, they can add nodes or appliances, whether they’re moving from test and development into production, or scaling out to support new or growing workloads.
To make acquisition a simple process, customers are able to take advantage of the vast EMC and VMware partner networks
WHAT APPLICATIONS CAN I RUN ON IT? ARE MULTIPLE HARDWARE PLATFORMS SUPPORTED AND IF SO WHICH ONES?
The VxRail is designed to handle almost any workload you choose to place on it. The most common workload is VDI followed by mixed-purpose workloads. Through the network protocols, the VxRail can connect to most current industry standard hardware platforms.
WHAT IS THE POTENTIAL SCALE OF HYPERCONVERGED INFRASTRUCTURE? HOW TO I DETERMINE DELIVERY AND DEPLOYMENT, EXPECTED DELIVERY TIMEFRAMES, EXPECTED DEPLOYMENT TIMEFRAMES, EXPECTED TIMEFRAMES AND EFFORT REQUIRED TO SCALE UP, OR SCALE OUT A SOLUTION, EXPECTED TIME TO PRODUCTIVITY?
For smaller use cases where minimal infrastructure is required, customers can start small with VxRail – around 10 virtual machines. From there, the cluster can be scaled up to much larger configurations that can support environments of 3200 virtual machines spanned across 16 appliances containing 64 nodes.
It should be noted that for customers that are looking at 64 node configurations, there may be better architectural approaches given the amount of east to west network traffic that is generated by all hyperconverged appliances. A better approach at these higher scales is to use rack scale hyperconverged technology that incorporates switching infrastructure into the rack to allow a far higher scale.
From the moment you power-on the VxRail, it will only take 15 minutes to be provisioning virtual machines. To add another appliance to the cluster takes 5 minutes. To ease the burden of system administrators, over 200 configuration tasks and workflows have been automated.
HOW WILL MOVING TO HYPERCONVERGED INFRASTRUCTURE AFFECT MY REFRESH CYCLE AND IT DEPARTMENT?
Hyperconverged infrastructure immediately eliminates the need for a forklift upgrade. If you have a cluster of appliances and you need to add one more, you simply add it to the cluster within 5 minutes in an automated manner. Vmotion will move the workload to the new appliance. The customer then removes the older appliance if necessary. All of this is done non-disruptively – providing a TCO and operational improvement for customers.
HOW SHOULD IT BE MANAGED? WHAT ABOUT SUPPORT. SHOULD AN ENTERPRISE LOOK FOR INTEGRATED SUPPORT FOR FULL SOLUTION STACK FROM SINGLE OR MULTIPLE POINTS, SPARE PARTS, AVAILABILITY OF PARTS, LOCATION OF PARTS, SERVICE AND RESPONSE TIMES, LOCATION OF SUPPORT, FREQUENCY OF SOFTWARE UPDATES, CONSEQUENCES FOR MISSED SLA’S. DO YOU REALLY NEED 24/7/365 WITH 4HR RESPONSE OR CAN YOU SETTLE FOR A LOWER SERVICE LEVEL DUE TO THE RESILIENCY, REDUNDANCY AND RELIABILITY OF THE SOLUTION?
VXrail comes with an integrated Vxrail Manager, which provide customers deep hardware awareness with up-to-the-minute holistic notifications about the state of applications, VM and applicance. VxRail Maanger leverages VMware Log Insight which capture events at the system level. VxRail Manager software also provides one-click, non-disruptive patches and upgrades.
HOW MUCH TIME DO YOU NEED TO INVEST IN ARCHITECTING THE SOLUTION, SIZING THE INITIAL SOLUTION, AND DETERMINING HOW THE SOLUTION WOULD BEST FIT YOUR REQUIREMENTS? IF THE SOLUTION IS ENGINEERED FROM THE FACTORY THIS WILL REDUCE YOUR EFFORT. ARE YOU EXPECTED TO BE THE PLATFORM ARCHITECT AND BUILD ALL THE INDIVIDUAL COMPONENTS AND DO ALL THE INTEGRATION?
The big question for CIOs and architects over the past few years has been “build versus buy”. One of the reasons that VCE is so successful is due to the fact we provide a curated experience for our customers, providing a converged infrastructure that is delivered after a physical and logical manufacturing process. That’s what made us the leader in the converged infrastructure category.
With VxRail, we are taking that same approach and bringing it to a broader audience. Sizing a VxRail solution is simple, with tools available for customers and partners.
It’s important to remember that the VxRail is a range of appliances, not a single product. This range forms part of a broader family of converged infrastructure, which also contains blocks and racks. The significance of this approach is that VCE is taking a platform rather than a product centric approach to enterprise architecture. Customers can build a complete platform for their enterprise IT, mixing and matching any type of VCE Converged Infrastructure, while maintaining consistency in the architecture, allowing centralized management, and the sharing and pooling of resources.
HOW WILL THE FEATURES OF HYPERCONVERGED STORAGE COMPARE TO MY LEGACY STORAGE?
Many of the features found in legacy storage are not present within hyper-converged technology. Some examples include fiber channel connectivity and queue Depth.
Hyper-converged uses software to define attributes commonly found in legacy storage. This in turn provides a layer of abstraction from the application to the storage giving the customer decreased complexity, increased agility and easing the path to full automation.