Island Networks are Flexpod data centre specialists providing solutions based on Cisco UCS Severs. Cisco UCS (Unified Computing Systems) servers unify computing, networking, management, virtualisation, and storage access into a single integrated architecture. This unique architecture enables end-to-end server visibility, management, and control in both bare metal and virtual environments, and facilitates the move to cloud computing and IT-as-a-Service with Fabric-Based Infrastructure.

Accelerate Server Deployment

The smart, programmable infrastructure of Cisco UCS simplifies and speeds enterprise-class application and service deployment in bare-metal, virtualised, and cloud computing environments. With unified model-based management, configuring hundreds of servers is as fast as configuring just one server — with lower cost of ownership and improved business continuity.

Centralise Management

Cisco UCS Manager provides embedded management of all software and hardware components in the Cisco UCS. Automatic server configuration and data center automation provide ideal support for cloud computing environments. With Cisco UCS Central, management can be extended globally to thousands of servers across multiple UCS domains and geographies.

Evolving to a Unified Data Center Architecture

Today’s data centre architecture must support a highly-mobile workforce, proliferation of devices, data-driven business models, and be capable of seamlessly incorporating cloud applications and services. To meet these diverse requirements, Cisco offers the Unified Data Center platform, a unified data centre architecture that combines compute, storage, network and management into a platform designed to automate IT as a service across physical and virtual environments, resulting in increased budget efficiency, more agile business responsiveness, and simplified IT operations.

Cisco’s Unified Data Center provides a complete architecture platform including products and solutions in three critical areas:

• Unified Management: The Unified Management component of Cisco’s data centre architecture features automation, orchestration, and lifecycle management to simplify deployment and operation of physical/bare metal, virtual, and cloud infrastructure. Cisco assists IT departments with developing a self-service portal and service catalog to quickly deliver on-demand IT services to support business initiatives.
• Unified Fabric: The Unified Fabric component of Cisco’s data centre architecture delivers high-performance data and storage networking to simplify deployment, help ensure quality of experience, and reduce operating costs. Cisco’s services provide high-speed connectivity and high-availability, increase application performance, and reduce security risk in multi-tenant environments.
• Unified Computing: Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) anchors the Cisco data centre architecture with a highly-scalable, system-level computing solution that integrates computing, access networking, and storage networking. Embedded management capabilities simplify operations across physical, virtual, and cloud infrastructure.
• Data Center Services: Smart, personalised services from Cisco and our authorised partners help you realise the full value of your data centre investment.

Integrated Solutions

Cisco Unified Data Center is the optimum platform for Cisco Hosted Collaboration solutions and the foundation of pretested and pre-configured solution stacks such as the Flex Pod Infrastructure Platforms. Open standards and APIs allow for integration and management of hardware and software solutions from Cisco ecosystem partners, providing flexibility to data centre architecture.

Cisco’s Unique Value

Cisco avoids the complexity of a converged infrastructure through an innovative data centre architecture designed specifically to support virtualisation in the data centre. Cisco Unified Data Center provides:

• Outstanding performance across physical and virtualised resources
• Cost efficiency through elimination of silos and simplification of deployment and operating tasks
• Fast deployment of a highly secure, proven infrastructure to support new business initiatives
• A broad range of storage, virtualisation, application, and management alliance partners

The Unified Data Center also offers a flexible and open data centre architecture that will support legacy infrastructure components, as well as delivery of IT-as-a-Service and cloud services.

Cisco UCS Servers

Move Beyond Infrastructure Maintenance

As enterprise computing systems increase in scale, they also increase in complexity. And as complexity increases, so does the expense of deployment and ongoing management.

Today, more than 70 percent of IT budget is spent simply to maintain and manage existing infrastructure (Source: Forrester, December 2008). As a result, IT organisations must continually increase resources to maintain a complex and inflexible infrastructure versus using them to rapidly and effectively respond to business needs.

IT organisations are looking for ways to substantially decrease cost of ownership while increasing IT business value. The Cisco Unified Computing System helps address these challenges by streamlining data centre resources, scaling service delivery, and radically reducing the number of devices requiring setup, management, power and cooling, and cabling.

Bridge the Divide Between IT and Business Needs

The Cisco Unified Computing System can deliver the following benefits:

• Reduce total cost of ownership at the platform, site, and organisational levels
• Increase IT staff productivity and business agility through just-in-time provisioning and mobility support for both virtualised and non-virtualised environments
• Help enable scalability through a design for up to 160 discrete servers in a single highly available management domain, or thousands of servers in a multi-domain environment
• Use industry standards supported by a partner ecosystem of innovative, trusted industry leaders

Separate Scale from Complexity

As a next-generation data centre platform, the Cisco Unified Computing System:

• Unites computing, networking, storage access, and virtualisation into a cohesive system
• Integrates a low-latency, lossless, 10 Gigabit Ethernet unified network fabric with enterprise-class, x86-architecture servers

This approach separates scale from complexity. Whether the system has one server or thousands of servers, all resources participate in a unified management environment designed to:

• Reduce total cost of ownership at the platform, site, and organisational levels
• Increase IT staff productivity and business agility through just-in-time provisioning and mobility support

Simplified Management

Help enable operational efficiency with rapid provisioning of infrastructure from shared pools of computing, storage access, and network resources; facilitate scaling of IT infrastructure through unified, global, model-based management with service profiles.

Industry Recognition

Hear what analysts have to say about Cisco Unified Computing System and learn more about this award-winning architecture.

• Awards and Recognition

Resources

• Unified Computing Services

Case Studies

• Unified Computing Case Studies

Unified Management

Enhance Speed, Efficiency, and Innovation

Cisco Unified Management solutions help organisations to automate and manage their IT infrastructure and services to meet the needs of the business. Cisco data centre and cloud management software provides the flexibility and agility needed for IT to deliver services faster, more efficiently, and with lower total cost of ownership.

Cisco Unified Management is optimised for the Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) and Cisco Nexus architectures as well as heterogeneous data centre and cloud environments, across both physical and virtual resources. Unified Management solutions include:

• Self-service portal and service catalog for on-demand provisioning of IT resources
• Automation and orchestration of IT processes, with integration into existing IT systems management tools
• Resource management that delivers performance isolation and efficient use of hardware infrastructure pools
• Workload automation to deliver efficient batch and event-driven enterprise business processes
• Lifecycle management from request to retirement to ensure optimisation of resources
• Policy-based management for improved governance and control

In addition, Cisco Unified Management offers:

• Management of both virtual and physical resources for bare-metal and multiple hypervisor environments
• Automated network provisioning, to simplify the deployment of network services in a virtual data centre Orchestration of complex operational processes for SAP and other enterprise applications
• Scheduling and automation for big data and business intelligence workloads

If you have any questions about Island Networks and the sevices we provide, please call us on +353 (0)1 9026303 or email us at info@islandnetworks.ie