Halcyon v2 19/12/08 13:03 Page 38
Management
What does the future
hold for Data Centres?
The mega data centre is rapidly moving centre stage as
organisations look to virtualisation, consolidation and
centralisation to achieve cost reduction and corporate social
responsibility (CSR) objectives. By Donnie MacColl,
Head of Technical Services at Halcyon.
Yet today’s IT infrastructure is highly Furthermore, multiple maintenance carefully considered. The “eggs in one
complex, typically multi-platform and contracts can be replaced with a basket” approach will naturally offer
supports 24x7 business critical, end single, lower cost contract, shaving lower maintenance costs than if you
to end processes creating new additional cost off the budget. were to run numerous systems. But
demands for the efficient data centre. if one single server fails it’s simple to
Viewed from a high level, the “plug in” another. If a larger system
CIOs will never achieve their cost environmental claims of the data goes down containing hundreds of
reduction targets if the data centre centre look compelling. According to virtual servers there has to be a
requires an army of highly paid, highly one hardware supplier, within 15 resilient contingency plan in place.
skilled individuals to keep it up and months the cost of electricity used by Virtualisation is the reason data
running. It is only by leveraging highly one server will be equivalent to that centres are investing heavily in
intuitive, cross-platform system hardware’s original price. automated management solutions to
management tools that the CIO can Consolidating onto one or two reduce human error, provide early
remove the reliance on the IT centralised machines should, in warning systems and lower the cost
specialist and run an effective, theory, result in a dramatic drop in of management.
efficient data centre with a small team power consumption, supporting CSR
of less skilled individuals. policies and driving costs down Are business growth and strategic
further. business requirements in danger of
Consolidation and being compromised by short term
Virtualisation Trend But in the headlong rush to meet economic goals? Or will the cost of
There is a considerable shift away corporate objectives, are CIOs highly skilled, highly paid IT specialists
from the distributed, server based recognising the new demands that will employed to meet those requirements
infrastructure towards centralised, be placed on the 21st century data fundamentally undermine the data
consolidated data as CIOs look to centre? Will the new mega data centre centre cost benefits?
address the top two business be able to meet the volume of
concerns – costs and green issues. business in an acceptable time frame? Centralised Challenge
Will the CIO be able to leverage this Driving down running costs and
Without a doubt, the data centre can consolidated infrastructure to extract improving operational efficiencies
support significant reduction in more volume from existing resources? remains the key objective for the CIO.
headcount: replacing the diverse skills And, critically, will the cost and power Yet the mega data centre carries a
required to support a distributed consumption objectives actually be significantly higher risk strategy,
infrastructure with a core data centre achieved? creating a very vulnerable single point
team can contribute massively to While the downsides to virtualisation of potential failure. Disaster recovery
achieving new budgetary targets. are few, those that do exist should be plans must be robust and
38 | DATA CENTRE SOLUTIONS | www.datacentresols.com Winter 2008
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