Cost cutting. It seems to be the mantra echoed in every corporation. CIOs are searching and analyzing ways for technology to help the bottom line of the business. One such technology that is making strong inroads for corporate IT departments is the concept of virtualization.
Virtualization is not a new technology. Creating “guest computers” or guest hosts on computers has been around since the early 1980’s with commercial deployment of UNIX and its variants along with IBM mianframe VM operating system. In those early days of computing the end users “computer” was nothing more than a display screen with a keyboard that connected back to the main computer using Ethernet or coaxial cable. These end user stations were commonly called “dumb” terminals because they performed no processing on their own. These early terminals were text based and showed rudimentary graphics – lines connecting to other lines – at best. All the applications were running on a centralized computer and the interface was all text driven. Remote locations were connected back to the centralized computer data center using dial-up lines, 56Kbps private connections, and dedicated private T1 connections.
Since then, true color graphics and images have become essential in delivering information, data and application functionality to the end user. Today, an Ethernet service connects intelligent desktop computers with more processing power than one hundred of the early mainframe computers. At best though, most of these desktop computers use a minimal amount of the processing power available to them.
To take advantage of the wasted processing power, technology has come full circle with putting “dumb” terminals back on the desktop. Through the use of virtualization older computers that were once thought to be junk can be reclaimed as a simple display and keyboard with the processing power for their “desktop” computer centralized on a more powerful central computer called a server.
Delivering the data and information from the central server running the virtualized desktop back to the actual end user requires more bandwidth. Ethernet Internet connections or private Ethernet, MPLS or VPLS networks to a remote facility with high bandwidth are a requirement to actualize the end user experience demanded by today’s multimedia applications. Though the IT manager is saving in new hardware purchases they must spend more for Ethernet, MPSL or VPLS service to connect each remote location. This is because the video, or music, or interactive application is no longer local but remote. Having the target display data remote requires more bandwidth on the Ethernet, MPLS or VPLS service connecting the location back to the central computer.
Ethernet broadband being available upwards of 40Gbps in some metropolitan areas can provide ample bandwidth to allow local multi-site locations to take full advantage of virtual computing. However, this Ethernet service is not available in all locations. It is safe to say that Ethernet broadband services are growing rapidly and expanding beyond the major cities and even traversing continents.
Cloud computing is the ultimate in virtualized computing. Cloud computing is basically an outsourced facility that manages the hardware, software, security and maintenance of a corporation’s data processing needs. With all data processing remote high bandwidth Ethernet Internet service is required. In fact, many large companies would require two connections possibly from different carriers to protect them from carrier outages. Cloud computing has given rise to the Software-as-a-Service or SaaS. Using SaaS and Ethernet Internet connections, MPLS or VPLS to the SaaS provider makes for a powerful combination of supporting virtualized desktops while meeting the CIOs edict of using technology to cut costs.
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