Overview of the IBM BladeCenter

IBM BladeCenter switches provide the small to mid size business with a number of tactical advantages. Companies can increase storage efficiency by permitting a sharing of disc storage across multiple servers over a shared private network or fabric provided by an IBM BladeCenter. This allows companies the ability to share physical resources with a variety of logical workloads. In essence, companies can focus their data to systems that are more easily stored and better managed through a central IBM BladeCenter switch. Let's consider some of the advantages.

Capacity Sharing

Moving the network to an IBM BladeCenter allows IT administrators to pool storage capacity and allocate it to each server as needed, so you get maximum flexibility to meet the changing needs of your technology. In contrast, direct attached storage only provides storage capacity to the server to which it is attached, resulting in storage islands or pools of storage capacity that's inaccessible to your other servers. An IBM BladeCenter Switch lets you access the storage capacity among all your servers, so you can better meet your storage needs for any given day, whether that's today or years down the road.

Storage Provisioning

An IBM BladeCenter allows for a more granular provisioning of your storage capacity. Rather than being tied to the physical capacity of one or more disk drives, volumes can be provisioned in any increment you need. As capacity requirements change, volumes can be resized in IBM BladeCenter switches. Often, the physical drive is much larger than is needed and just wasted space. Eliminate it completely by being able to move your storage capacity to wherever you need it.

Network Boot

Not only can you allocate more server data to the network with an IBM BladeCenter, but you can also move server boot images. You can create boot volumes at boot time to load the operating system image. This removes any disk storage space you'd need at the server, so you have lower service costs in reduced power and cooling requirements with an IBM BladeCenter switch. Utilizing this capacity, any machine can be used to boot a different operating image and then quickly be repositioned for another task. You get more flexibility and leverage in your data system allocation.

Software Updates

Updating application images can often result in considerable downtime. By utilizing IBM BladeCenter switches, you can update the remote application without affecting the server. The new application just needs to be restarted with the updated image for minimal down time. Make the changes and then reboot the system. The job is done, with no downtime required.

These advantages have caused many companies to utilize the capacity of an IBM BladeCenter. Storage becomes that much more efficient, but you get all the power and flexibility that your company needs. IBM BladeCenter switches give small to mid size companies the capacity to compete on a global scale.

About the Author:

Bob Wall Jr. is the author of this article on IBM BladeCenter. Find more information about IBM BladeCenter switch here.