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Rackable Systems is riding the cloud computing bandwagon with their new CloudRack enclosure system. The enclosure features a power distribution system that is more effecient and at least as reliable as existing embedded power supply units. Additionally the enclosure is designed to run at higher datacenter ambient temperatures — up to 104F degrees. This dovetails nicely with the recommendation from Google to raise your datacenter temperature.
Here’s an interesting Mercury News interview with Cisco’s CTO Padmasree Warrier.
Most of us have heard that Cisco is getting into the server business. But what I find interesting about this interview is Padmasree’s comments on a “unified computing” architecture — one that combines elements of computing, network, and storage. This is starting to sound vaguely familiar… sort of like VMWare’s Datacenter OS concept.
I will be speaking at the upcoming Secure360 conference held at the St. Paul RiverCentre on May 12th and 13th. My educational session is currently titled “Cost-effective Disaster Recovery Strategies“. I will be leading a discussion of disaster recovery technologies and architectures that organizations can deploy with limited budgets.
I emitted an audible “uh oh” when I read the recent Times Online article regarding the environmental impact of Google searches. Time to make some popcorn and grab a good seat to watch the fight.
I consider myself to be an environmentalist. I participate in activities such as camping, hiking, and scuba diving that are enhanced by a unscathed environment. I want my children, and my children’s children to enjoy clean water, mature trees, and a bountiful ecosystem. At the same time I want my children to be able to enjoy the luxuries and efficiencies that technologies provide.
So here is the question I would ask the proponents of this environmental study: What was the environmental impact of knowledge acquisition before Google? My gut tells me that Google has significantly decreased the environmental impact of knowledge acquisition. In the past people may have traveled to multiple libraries or research institutions to find knowledge. Maybe they had to fly oversees to visit museums. Or they wrote messages to companies on dead wood using something called “a pen”. Okay, you get the point.
Information providers and the datacenters they live in will become big targets for the carbon-credit crowd. Those providers better start preparing for the coming battle.
I was recently interviewed by Finance and Commerce magazine for an article related to enterprise security issues stemming from staff layoffs. I agree with the main point of the article: enterprises are woefully prepared to mitigate data security issues during significant reductions-in-force.
Negotiating contracts for datacenter services is a tricky business. I’ve been fortunate to be on both the buying and the selling side of the datacenter business over the past ten years. During this time I have gained some insights into some of the “gotchas” in the ways contracts are written. Let me share some of these insights with you today.
Autorenewing contract terms
Most datacenter service contracts incorporate autorenewing contract terms. The customer must notify the datacenter provider that they intend to cancel the service within a specified amount of time before the contract ends. If the customer doesn’t notify the datacenter provider the contract is automatically extended a certain length of time. For example, a contract could state that the customer must notify the datacenter provider within 60 days of the contract expiration otherwise the contract is automatically extended one more year. Datacenter providers love this type of contract language because they know that most customers forget about this notification requirement. As a buyer I would flip this requirement and make the datacenter provider notify me before the contract expiration. If they fail to notify me then the contract goes month-to-month.
1 year or 3 year deal?
Most managed service providers want their customers to sign multi-year contracts. The fact is that most providers don’t make any profit the first 6-12 months of the deal. The datacenter provider is basically supplying all the upfront capital and betting that the customer will stick around a few years. That’s one of the reasons that most providers offer multi-year discount pricing — i.e., 10% discount for signing a 3-year deal. So should a customer sign a 1 year or a 3 year contact? I think it depends on the type of service. If we are talking pure colo and your organization doesn’t plan to move for a couple years and you don’t like renegotiating contracts then I think a multi-year contract makes sense. If you are looking at managed services then a cost-benefit analysis is required. You need to understand that if you sign a multi-year contract your equipment will not be refreshed for the term of the contract. So while you are receiving a 10% discount in year 3 you will be using equipment that is over 2 years old. As a buyer I would rather sign a one-year contract and refresh my equipment on an annual basis. This makes even more sense if my infrastructure is completely virtualized. Because every year I would upgrade the performance and capacity of my services at little or no additional OPEX.
Co-terminus contract lengths
Here’s a very common gotcha in the service provider business. A customer signs a 2-year colo contract. After one year they decide they need more power. The customer then signs a 2-year power agreement. What they don’t realize is that they just extended their original colo contract for one more year. Service providers conveniently forget to tell their customers about that contract extension provision. As a buyer I would ensure that the contract length for any additional services I buy from the service provider expire at the same time as existing services — co-terminus contracts. So the customer that signed the power contract should have signed a 1-year agreement that terminated at the same time as their original colo agreement.
