Capitalizing On Virtualized Environments With Storage, VDI, Management, And More

Adding Value To Virtualized Environments

As more and more IT environments become virtualized, new ways to take advantage of those environments are being offered. These include new ways to build virtual desk infrastructures, perform storage and data protection functions, and add management capabilities that tie customers' virtual and physical infrastructures into a single, scalable, and flexible pool of resources and help lay the way for cloud computing.

Check out some of the new ways of adding value to virtualized environments.

Aria Systems: Cloud Billing And Management With VMware Cloud Director

Aria Systems, a San Mateo, Calif.-based provider of cloud billing and subscription management solutions, recently unveiled its Aria Cloud Revenue Adapter for vCloud Director. Designed for service providers offering cloud services to end users, the new product integrates with VMware's next-generation VMware Cloud Director virtualization platform to automate service activation, usage tracking, billing and collections. This provides usage information, including the number of virtualized instances, memory used, storage used, network bandwidth used and CPUs, so that service providers can manage those resources with pay-as-you-go billing for their end customers according to their own pricing, packaging and business rules.

Aspera: Sending Huge Files And VMs Like E-Mail

The new faspex Server 2.0 from Emeryville, Calif.-based Aspera is a global collaboration tool which provides a simple e-mail interface combined with Aspera's file-transfer software to send large data files. Users access faspex Server through a Web interface or desktop client, and send digital deliveries like they would an e-mail. Recipients are notified via e-mail to download the files via Aspera. This provides for quick and reliable transfer of massive files, often larger than a gigabyte. IT managers with virtualized environments can use faspex Server 2.0 to deliver previously localized data as well as the virtual machines themselves.

Brocade: Adding 'Pay-As-You-Grow' Capability To App Delivery Controllers

Brocade next week plans to release a new extension to its ServerIron ADX 4000 family of application delivery controllers for virtualized mid-market enterprises. The ServerIron ADX 4000 ASM-4 bundle is an entry-level chassis solution that provides Layer 4-7 switching for on-demand, automated data center computing. The license-activated capacity-on-demand capability provides ’pay-as-you-grow’ investment protection, allowing customers to double their throughput and future-proof their application delivery networks without adding hardware or removing the switches from the network. The ServerIron ADX 4000 ASM-4 bundle provides eight 1-Gbps small form-factor pluggable (SFP) copper ports, with an option to use fiber SFPs on all ports.

i365: Partnering On Data Protection In Virtualized Environment With VAR

i365, a Santa Clara-based developer of online data protection and recovery services, worked with Doylestown, Pa.-based solution provider Contour Data Solutions to implement i365's EVault Plug-n-Protect backup and recovery appliance together with EVault Replication software for Gateway Funding Diversified Mortgage Services.

Horsham, Pa.-based Gateway needed the solution after migrating to a virtualized IT environment based on VMware, a move which was incompatible with its tape-based data protection solutions. Contour installed one EVault Plug-n-Protect appliance as an active backup vault at Gateway's corporate office for replicating backup data offsite to a second appliance used as a passive vault at its disaster recovery site.

Isilon: Adding iSCSI To Scale-Out Storage

Isilon has integrated the iSCSI protocol into its OneFS operating system to deliver what the Seattle-based company called the industry's first unified scale-out storage platform for enterprises. Isilon scale-out storage lets users consolidate file- and block-based applications onto a single, shared pool of storage as way to simplify data management to increase resource utilization and efficiency for virtualized and non-virtualized environments. With its new iSCSI functionality, Isilon's suite of enterprise-class data management and protection software applications now support industry standard file-based protocols as well as the block-based iSCSI protocol in a single, shared pool of storage.

NComputing: Expanding Its Virtual Desktop Channel Business

NComputing, a Redwood City, Calif.-based developer of desktop virtualization technology, has expanded its U.S. and international operations as well as its channel, OEM and ISV programs in response to a 40 percent year-over-year revenue growth. NComputing, whose primary product is the L300 desktop virtualization solution, said it has just expanded its channel partner program to provide improved revenue, margin and customer opportunities, and during the fourth quarter plans to roll out joint marketing and education campaigns with partners, including Microsoft, to increase understanding and adoption of desktop virtualization in the enterprise.

QNAP Systems: New NAS Appliances For Virtualized Environments

QNAP Systems, Pomona, Calif., late this month plans to release four new "Pro+" versions of its Business Series Turbo NAS appliances. The new storage appliances include 1.8GHz Intel Atom dual-core CPUs, 1GB of RAM and a transfer rate of up to 116 MBs per second. They are VMware and Citrix ready and Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V cluster compliant, and provide iSCSI support in virtualized server clustering and virtualized environments. They include the two-drive TS-259 Pro+, the four-drive TS-459 Pro+, the five-drive TS-559 Pro+ and the six-drive TS-659 Pro+ (6-drive), which delivers up to 12 TB of capacity.

Syncsort And NetApp: Turnkey Backup Solution

Syncsort, of Woodcliff Lake, N.J., is working with NetApp on SMB heterogeneous open systems data protection. The new NetApp Syncsort Integrated Backup combines Syncsort backup management software with NetApp disk storage in a turnkey backup and recovery solution for heterogeneous data centers. NetApp Syncsort Integrated Backup provides "near zero impact" backups for virtual machines and heterogeneous data; application-aware snapshots; and instant virtual machine recovery, automated bare metal recovery and integrated disaster recovery. The solution includes Syncsort BEX software, NetApp Protection Pack and NetApp FAS2040 series disk systems. It is available through Arrow ECS and Avnet Technology Solutions.

Virtual Computer: Bare-Metal Desktop Hypervisor

Virtual Computer, the Westford, Mass.-based developer of the NxTop 3.0 bare-metal client-hypervisors, this month made it available as a stand-alone download. NxTop 3.0 enterprise management features include multiple integration points with complementary virtualization products, a hierarchical management model, remote help desk capability and policy-based bandwidth throttling. NxTop 3.0 supports the last three generations of Intel's Centrino platform and the latest AMD platform as well as a wide range of graphics processors. It also supports integrated and USB-based broadband modems and 64-bit guest operating systems. Virtual Computer also released NxTop Connect, software which lets businesses integrate NxTop with their server- and cloud-based computing infrastructures.

Wanova: Helping A Friend Manage And Protect Virtual Desktops

San Jose, Calif.-based Wanova, developer of Mirage software for centralizing the management, support and protection of remote and mobile PCs, said that Durable Data Corp. has begun deploying solutions combining Mirage and VMware View to expand its desktop management services. With the two, DDC, a San Antonio, Texas-based service provider specializing in onsite and cloud-based infrastructure management, can help manage customers' desktop environments, whether they are centralized or distributed, physical or virtual, or any combination. That allows DDC's DuraDesk cloud-based desktop management platform to centralize customers' desktops in the DDC data center and be with full protection and the ability to be remotely restored.

WhipTail Tech: Improving Solid-State SAN Performance For VDI

Whiptail Tech, a Summit, N.J.-based manufacturer of solid-state-based enterprise SANs, plans to shortly release generation 4 of its Racerunner Operating System (RROS) as part of its Virtual Desktop XLR8r and Datacenter XLR8r SANs. The G4 platform release features increases in write IOPs and a reduction in latency. Compared to its G3 platforms, which featured a sustained throughput of roughly 100,000 IOPs write, the new G4 platform can sustain a transfer rate in excess of 250,000 IOPS write at 4-KB logically random data based on real-world testing, WhipTail said.

Xangati: New Virtualization Management Capabilities

Xangati, Cupertino, Calif., this month added new capabilities to its entire suite of virtualization management solutions, including Xangati for ESX and the Xangati Management Dashboard (XMD), which provide performance insights for virtual machines, ESX hosts, storage, applications and end-user devices across both physical and virtual infrastructures without server or desktop agents. Enhancements include the ability to view the entire virtual infrastructure in a single pane; continuous scroll-bar views for virtual infrastructure performance; auto-thresholding, alerting and recording for response time metrics; one-click Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) end-user initiated problem recordings; and partitioned, real-time VM visibility login for application and server owners to obtain vCenter statistics.

Even More Ways To Add Value To Virtualized Environment

The VMworld conference, held in early September, saw a wide range of vendors bring other ways to add value to virtualized environments, including new data storage and protection technologies and new ways to manage those environments. Just click here for a look at some of those technologies.