The Power of Being There™
Case Study
The AMX and EMC - field proven technology at work
“We’re confident that the AMX
will provide benefits going
forward in terms of our
overall utilisation of IT
resources. In terms of
availability to the user, the
whole system is much easier
to deploy and to maintain.
It should also ultimately
save on costs.”
Brendan Nash, Network
Administrator at EMC Cork
The world’s Automated Networked Storage leader, EMC, operates a major
manufacturing and customer support centre at Cork, Ireland, in addition to a
newly established large scale data centre.
When senior data centre administrators at EMC sought a new server management
solution, the principal requirements were that it would be powerful in its
performance, totally reliable and infinitely expandable. They chose the AMX from
Avocent, an analogue matrix KVM switching solution designed for simple
installation and immediately enhanced network manageability.
AMX is designed to support growing server installations allowing simultaneous
control and operation of multiple servers independently of each other. It
intelligently facilitates multi-user, multi-platform and multi-rack server
environments and provides end-to end CAT 5 connectivity for access from the desk
to the server. It includes the AMX5000 analogue matrix switch, the AMIQ CAT 5
cable interface, the AMX 5100 user station, the OSCAR on-screen management tool
and AMWorks, an advanced Java based system administration software tool.
Brendan Nash, Network Administrator at EMC Cork outlines the issues involved:
“We wanted a layered solution which would be entirely scalable for the future.
Given that our new data centre facility has an area of 5,500 square feet, the distances
from the user to the rack were a key consideration. One of the main attractions of
AMX is its standard use of CAT 5 cabling. EMC already has a complete CAT 6 loop
within our facility and AMX provides us with plug and play throughout our
infrastructure.”
“AMX can drive servers up to 1,000 feet away from the controllers’ desks and we can
patch into and access any of our servers using the cabling on site. Similarly,
locating individual workstations in remote meeting rooms is simplicity itself. From
their desktops, controllers can also overview what’s happening across the network
and begin working directly on an individual box when the need arises. Private and
shared environments are both possible from desk to desk - it has very strong
advantages in terms of its overall usability.”
The AMX 5000 on its own is a 32 port main switching box connecting to clients
across a CAT 5 interface and supporting up to eight users. The AMX 5100 is a
desktop user station, which connects the client to the AMX5000. Avocent’s OSCAR
on-screen management tool then allows for convenient switching between devices
or AMWorks allows for centralised administration. EMC and Avocent technicians
undertook the implementation of the Avocent solution. The AMX solution was
supplied by Enterprise Solutions Ltd., Avocent’s national distributor, who provided
pre and post sales support.
The Power of Being There
Case Study
The AMX and EMC - field proven technology at work
“AMX is very intuitive, the first thing it does on plug-in is to identify users and
connected devices. Using a well formulated GUI, it then provides an instant menu
to work from. Its architecture makes it easy to add more servers and if the switch
itself should fail to operate it keeps clients live until they can be connected
elsewhere. Each server is also given a unique identification which eases
configuration and facilitates security procedures including access authorisation and
event tracking,” comments Brendan.
EMC’s Cork centre supports customers in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. It is
also responsible for product development, including production and testing, as well
as dial-in support and solutions development. The data centre manages a mixed
environment from Solaris, NT/2000, Linux and spans server hardware from
Compaq/Hewlett Packard, DELL and Sun servers.
“ The KVM (keyboard, video, mouse) network management solution we’ve deployed
here is scalable to manage several thousand servers. We expect our current KVM
requirements to rise from our initial host base into the hundreds which we can
easily accommodate given the scalability and flexibility of the AMX architecture.”
“We use our own data centre to demonstrate best practices for data centre
management to our customers. In this regard, the AMX was a better solution than
the competition we looked at. We were also confident based on our knowledge and
experience of the same provider’s XP4040 switching solution which had already
been deployed on site.”
Mr. Nash concluded, “We’re confident that the AMX will provide benefits going
forward in terms of our overall utilisation of IT resources. In implementing new
devices, new hosts and servers and troubleshooting, the process has been speeded
up tremendously. In terms of availability to the user, the whole system is much
easier to deploy and to maintain. It should also ultimately save on costs.”
avocent international ltd.
avocent house | shannon free zone | shannon | co. clare | ireland
www.avocent.com
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