Plan Ahead to Prevent Maintenance Window Pain

System administrators may be inclined to procrastinate when it comes to the maintenance window process due to the perception of risk. However, that only leads to the possibility of devastating problems down the road. The most critical component of a successful maintenance window is planning....

10 Cloud Computing Predictions For 2010

Cloud storage adoption will continue to broaden as service providers implement technologies that further reduce latency and overhead. While costs are attractive, the biggest inhibitors to adoption of cloud storage have been IO latency, overhead, and security. For many users, the security concerns have been reasonably addressed (althou...

Fighting Back In 2010 with A ‘Just Enough’ Model

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Understanding Data Centre Efficiencies

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How do I determine the optimum fan-out ratio on a storage-area network (SAN) array?

Many methods have been used to determine the optimum number of hosts per storage port, but in my experience there are no hard and fast rules. My recommendation would be to assess the throughput of each host you want to connect to a particular port, determine the maximum throughput of that port, and add hosts to the port so that the total throughput of all hosts is slightly higher than the throu...

Keeping The Data Centre Going Over Christmas - The Importance Of DR, Back-Up And Staffing / Management

As the Christmas holidays draw nearer, businesses are preparing for the festive close down and staff are looking forward to some well earned downtime.  Sadly, downtime for the business is not an option and for those concerned with data protection and disaster recovery the risk does not go away.   ...

What are the main steps when configuring a storage-area network (SAN) switch?

Determining the steps in a storage-area network (SAN) switch configuration depends on whether you are building a new SAN fabric or adding a switch to an existing one. If this is the first switch in the SAN fabric, it will be the principal switch. You will need to configure IP details so that you can communicate with the switch via a Web browser or a command line interface. Once this is complete...

Disaster Recovery Is Not a 'Project'

It is folly to view disaster recovery as just another IT project to cross off a checklist. Its very purpose is to ensure that a company can continue to do business without interruption, come what may. This requires a well-defined strategy that brings together the right technologies, people, processes and protocols....

What Factors Will Prohibit Organisations From Moving To The Cloud?

So the cloud hype train rolls on and we’re all constantly being told how the cloud can help cut costs, increase agility and reduce time to market. The cloud certainly has its advantages and for SMBs and start ups with little or no ‘IT baggage’ the cloud is an attractive proposition. Read more: http://www.itproportal.com/network/news/article/2009/12/9/what-factors-will-prohi...

What are the best practices for how far away backup tapes should be stored offsite?

Despite the increased use of disk and wide-area network (WAN) replication, tape continues to play a vital role in data protection strategies. The location of your backup tapes is a key factor in any disaster recovery (DR) plan, and should be chosen based on your organisation's defined recovery time objective (RPO) and recovery point objective (RPO)....

Getting The Most Out Of The Cloud

By Tom Brand, virtualisation practice lead at GlassHouse Technologies Businesses are bombarded by suppliers claiming to improve efficiencies and offer return on investment (ROI) with a variety of new cloud services with varying degrees of in-house control....

How Cloud Economics Will Change IT

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How Cloud Economics Will Change IT

Any IT department that has not embraced cloud computing had better be prepared to talk about it, at the very least, and that means getting a grasp on some wispy concepts. What are the true costs of cloud services? Does the cloud model support a corporation's overall economic goals? Is an internal cloud viable? Is cloud availability adequate?...

Why is A DR Strategy So Important Today?

Simon Johnson, disaster recovery practice lead at GlassHouse Technologies (UK) discusses the importance of a disaster recovery (DR) strategy and asks how much downtime can you really afford and what level of protection can you get away with?...

What type of data storage media is best for data with long retention requirements?

Deciding what data storage media to use depends on whether the data you're storing is live or backup data. Live data consists of files that are still part of a mounted file system, while backup data consists of files that are housed in a data backup system....