2013 Issue 04

Your guide to maximizing IT efficiency Dell.com/powersolutions

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Zeroing in on the right devices for a client refresh

Expediting workload performance with flash storage

Optimizing the virtual desktop experience through strong back-end design

Achieving deep network security through a connected, holistic strategy

Transitioning to Windows 7 and Windows 8 on innovative Dell clients helps take your business in exciting new directions. Migration services from Dell speed the way.

Smoothmigration

Dell World 2013 special issue

S:6.875"S:9"

T:8.375"T:10.875"

B:8.625"B:11.125"

20%of the cost.**

Your data demands are growing. Your budget didn’t get the memo.

*Based on internal Dell analysis in July 2013 based on Dell Compellent flash-optimized vs. spinning disk arrays and an internal test performed by Dell in March 2013 with Storage Center v6.3.10 on dual SC8000 controllers running OLTP type workloads using IOmeter with a 100% random, 70/30 read/write mix and 8K sector transfer size achieved this IOPS performance. Actual performance/latency will vary based on configuration, usage and manufacturing variability.

**Based on internal Dell analysis performed in May 2013, comparing similar Dell Compellent offerings to EMC VNX Family, HP 3PAR StoreServ, HP EVA, IBM V7000, IBM XIV, Hitachi Data Systems HUS 100 Family, and Oracle Sun ZFS Storage Family and competitive US list pricing from Gartner Inc, CP Storage, as of June 2013.

© 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Enter Dell Flash-Optimized Storage Solutions.

Engineered with intelligence to provide the high performance of flash at the price of a disk. Easily make applications run as fast as your business demands by putting 100% of hot data on flash. Which results in breakthrough efficiency, without breaking the bank.

Transform your storage now at Dell.com/compellent

75%increased system performance.*

Dell recommends Windows.

2013 Issue 04

20 Zeroing in on the right devices for a client refreshBy Christian Childs

From aging hardware to expiring operating systems, organizations

are finding prime opportunities to refresh their client fleet.

Innovative Dell Latitude laptops deliver secure, manageable and

reliable features to meet today’s enterprise requirements.

24 Staying connected for work-from-anywhere productivity

By Rich Nockels and Steve Gilbert

Today’s on-the-go workforce seeks an optimal balance of mobility

and performance. The Dell Venue 11 Pro tablet offers extreme

flexibility by combining the power of an Ultrabook™ system, the

functionality of a desktop and the portability of a tablet.

26 University of Maryland University College: Empowering faculty and staff with desktop technology refreshUniversity of Maryland University College boosts faculty and staff

productivity by working with Dell to refresh outdated computers

and migrate to a standardized Windows 7 environment.

Dell.com/powersolutions

48 Network security that mitigates risk while maintaining high performance

72 Global, expert IT partners who help advance business success

70 Innovative yacht design using a high-performance computing cluster

60 Dell services for modernizing SAP environments with minimal downtime

42 Data center modernization to create an agile IT infrastructure

16 Cover story

Preparing for a rapid, efficient Windows migrationBy Eugenio Soltero and Jefferson Raley

It’s time to pull out the stops before Microsoft®

Windows® XP support ends on April 8, 2014. Migration

services from Dell offer a holistic approach to fit any

enterprise’s needs, whether starting a new migration

or fast-forwarding one in progress.

2 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

28 Expediting workload performance with flash storageBy Jeremy Garner and John Mannix

Flash storage boosts the real-time responsiveness

of applications running highly transactional,

I/O-intensive workloads. Dell Compellent Flash-

Optimized solutions are designed to deliver the speed

of flash at the capacity and price of rotating disk.

31 Boosting storage performance and efficiency for diversified workloadsBy Achmad Chadran, Dylan Locsin and Jeff Junker

The steep increase of data quantities and workload

diversity in virtualized environments requires storage

that can keep up. The latest generation of Dell

EqualLogic storage helps organizations meet the

challenge while minimizing management complexity.

Editor’s comments

6 Channel surfingBy Tom Kolnowski

Recent citings

8 20/20 vision

Perspectives

10 Calculating risk: What have you got to lose?By Jim Stikeleather and Sanjib Sahoo

By broadening their risk management outlook, IT

leaders can spark remarkable innovation and growth.

Understanding six key truths helps decision makers

overcome the fear of failure and develop effective

skill sets to achieve untold business results.

14 Bridge builderIngrid Vanderveldt, entrepreneur-in-residence at

Dell, sparks the right mix of strategic collaboration,

technology innovation and funding to help

upstart visionaries realize their dreams — and large

enterprises tap into the entrepreneurial mind-set.

Features

42 Taking a holistic approach to data center modernizationBy Vikram Belapurkar and Wendy Williams

Data center modernization is the linchpin for

creating an agile, cost-effective and resilient IT

infrastructure. Standards-based Dell server, storage

and networking technology, combined with Dell

Application Modernization services, smooth the way.

58 How social media analytics transform conversations into insightsBy Shree Dandekar

Conversations carried out in diverse

online channels can strongly affect

an organization’s brand reputation.

The Social Net Advocacy metric from

Dell helps organizations embrace

the power of social media to stay

competitive and relevant.

36 Optimize the virtual desktop experience through strong back-end designBy Bob Ganley

Desktop virtualization streamlines support for a

dynamic workforce while providing employees with

easy, secure access to enterprise resources. Seven best

practices help guide a successful design of the critical

back-end IT infrastructure.

48 Achieving deep network security through a connected, holistic strategyBy Daniel Ayoub

A network security strategy should address today’s

security and compliance issues as well as tomorrow’s

threats. Dell Connected Security solutions offer

a proactive approach that mitigates present and

anticipated risks while maintaining performance.

51 Continuing the transformational journey toward peak network agilityBy Brian Johnson and Rich Hernandez

Network virtualization helps data centers boost

operational efficiency and scale quickly to meet

dynamic workload demands. Dell and Intel support

automated, flexible networking with network overlays

using the Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN) protocol.

54 Bridging physical and virtual networks with ease and efficiencyBy Kamesh Kothuri and James Wynia

Virtualization and network simplification are top

priorities for IT strategists. The high-performance

Dell Networking S6000 switch streamlines operations

and acts as a gateway to bridge and unify physical and

virtual environments in the data center.

60 Modernizing SAP environments with minimal downtime and riskBy Karthik Konaparthi, Wendy Williams and Maggie Smith

Moving enterprise applications to efficient, cost-

effective platforms helps organizations gain a

competitive edge. Discover how Dell and SAP

modernization solutions help cut migration risk while

avoiding costly, prolonged downtime.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 3

4 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Index to featured Dell customers

Castro Mello Architects .................................................................... 65

CoreLogic ............................................................................................ 42

Denver Broncos .................................................................................. 50

Emirates Team New Zealand .......................................................... 70

Eved ........................................................................................................ 15

Hudson County, New Jersey .......................................................... 40

Japan Pulp and Paper Company ................................................... 69

Life Technologies ............................................................................... 65

Mi-WiFi .................................................................................................. 68

Network Redux .................................................................................... 15

Oral Roberts University ......................................................................74

Pflugerville Independent School District .......................................18

Pixomondo .......................................................................................... 65

Quarles & Brady ...................................................................................37

Skýrr........................................................................................................ 69

Socorro Independent School District ........................................... 39

University of Maryland University College ................................... 26

Index to advertisersAmerican Power Conversion Corporation ................................... 13

Dell Inc. ...............................................................................7, 19, C2, C4

FusionStorm .........................................................................................C3

PrinterLogic ...........................................................................................75

SanDisk .....................................................................................................5

Going mobile? Take us with you

Dell Power Solutions

Magazine — your guide to

maximizing IT efficiency —

offers the latest in expert

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64 Accelerating applications and virtual desktops with GPUsBy Michael Lasen, Maximilian LeRoux and Travis Wells

The performance demands of visual and high-performance

computing call for a powerful engine to keep pace.

Dell computers use NVIDIA® graphics processors to

enhance business and scientific processing as well as the

virtual desktop user experience.

72 Advancing business success through expert IT partnersBy James Wright and Heather Hernandez

To leverage the latest tech innovations, many enterprises

turn to Dell’s value-added resellers around the globe.

Supported by an award-winning PartnerDirect program,

Dell partners offer the expertise and experience to deliver

leading-edge solutions.

Sponsored content: Solution showcase

35 Dell PowerVault tape solutionsCost-effective data protection and preservation

46 Samsung SSDsUltrahigh-speed, durable and efficient

67 NVIDIA GPUsTop-notch performance and productivity

Innovators

68 Dell innovatorsMeet businesses building success with technology.

Customer perspective

70 Emirates Team New Zealand: Smooth sailingEmirates Team New Zealand makes waves using a Dell

high-performance computing cluster to speed next-

generation multihull boat innovation, blazing the way for

high-speed racing at the 2013 America’s Cup.

74 Oral Roberts University: Partnering for a first-rate virtual desktop infrastructure deploymentOral Roberts University joins with Dell Premier Partner

EAGLE Software, Inc., to implement a virtual desktop

infrastructure that brings exceptional flexibility, manageability

and cost-efficiency to the school’s campus.

Dell, Compellent, EqualLogic, Latitude, PowerVault and Venue are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Ronny Northrop

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challenging data center environments. SanDisk.com/Enterprise

Source: KnowIT Information System, Prof. Michael Goul, Arizona State University. ©SanDisk Corporation 2013

6 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Editorial staffEditor-in-chief and publisher Tom KolnowskiManaging editor Debra McDonaldFeatures editor Kathryn WhiteSenior editors Julie Addicott, Myriam Darmon,

Dawn Davidson, James Hurd and Catherine LuoArt director and cover designer David ChanDesigner and illustrator Cynthia WebbCirculation and logistics manager Sharon Mendoza

Staff writers Romy Bauer, Archie Lawhorne and Chris Young

Contributing writers Daniel Ayoub, Vikram Belapurkar, Achmad Chadran, Christian Childs, Shree Dandekar, Bob Ganley, Jeremy Garner, Steve Gilbert, Heather Hernandez, Rich Hernandez, Brian Johnson, Jeff Junker, Karthik Konaparthi, Kamesh Kothuri, Michael Lasen, Maximilian LeRoux, Dylan Locsin, John Mannix, Rich Nockels, Jefferson Raley, Sanjib Sahoo, Maggie Smith, Eugenio Soltero, Jim Stikeleather, Travis Wells, Wendy Williams, James Wright and James Wynia

Advertising and sponsorship salesSales director Kyle Walkenhorst (626-396-9400)Sales manager/Western U.S. and South/Central America

sales Shaun Mehr (949-923-1660)Eastern U.S. and Canada sales Steve Branda (201-483-7871)EMEA and APJ sales Mark Makinney (805-709-4745) Advertising sales assistant Cindy Elhaj (626-396-9400)Ad coordinator Catherine Luo

Reader servicesSubscriptions are complimentary to qualified readers who complete the online subscription form. To subscribe to the regular quarterly edition of Dell Power Solutions Magazine, visit the Subscription Center at Dell.com/powersolutions. Once there, you can sign up for a new subscription, change your mailing address for a current subscription or unsubscribe. Going mobile? Visit the digital edition online at zinio.com/powersolutions. For other subscription services, please email our Reader Services team via us_power_solutions@dell.com.

About DellDell Inc., headquartered in Round Rock, Texas, near Austin, listens to its customers and delivers innovative technology and services they trust and value. Uniquely enabled by its direct business model, Dell is a leading global systems and services company and No. 51 on the Fortune 500 list. For more information, visit our website at Dell.com.

Dell cannot be responsible for errors in typography or photography. Dell, the Dell logo, Dell Precision, Dell ProSupport, ChangeBASE, Clean Wireless, Compellent, ControlVault, Data Progression, EqualLogic, Fluid Data, Foglight, KACE, Latitude, OpenManage, OptiPlex, PocketCloud, PowerEdge, PowerVault, Reassembly-Free Deep Packet Inspection, SharePlex, SonicWALL, Strike Zone, Tri-Metal, Venue, vWorkspace, Wyse and XPS are trademarks of Dell Inc. Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this publication to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products. Dell disclaims any proprietary interest in the marks and names of others.

Dell Power Solutions (ISSN 2325-6281, print; ISSN 2325-6273, online) is published quarterly by Dell Inc., Dell Power Solutions, One Dell Way, Mail Stop RR3-68, Round Rock, TX 78682, U.S.A. No part of this publication may be reprinted or otherwise reproduced without permission from the editor-in-chief. Dell does not provide any warranty as to the accuracy of any information provided through Dell Power Solutions. Opinions expressed in this magazine may not be those of Dell. The information in this publication is subject to change without notice. Any reliance by the end user on the information contained herein is at the end user’s risk. Dell will not be liable for information in any way, including but not limited to its accuracy or completeness. Dell does not accept responsibility for the advertising content of the magazine or for any claims, actions or losses arising therefrom. Goods, services and/or advertisements within this publication other than those of Dell are not endorsed by or in any way connected with Dell Inc.

Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Printed in the U.S.A.

2013 Issue 4

What’s your favorite content channel? Beyond our customary print and

online channels for delivering Power Solutions content, we have been

working behind the scenes to increase our selection of premium all-

digital channels for emerging mobile and tablet platforms. For instance,

Power Solutions is available on the Zinio digital newsstand, where the Zinio reader app

has been updated on the heels of the Windows 8.1 launch. The app is enhanced to

boost performance and accelerate downloads, and it also includes full support for native

Windows gestures. Moreover, the Windows 8.1 version of the app — as well as versions

for other platforms — enables library synchronization across multiple devices and the

capability to archive back issues.

Getting a Windows 8.1 device running with the free Zinio app is as simple as

visiting the Windows Store at qrs.ly/cd3ovjo. After launching the app, a complimentary

subscription to Power Solutions can be accessed easily from among Zinio’s over 5,500

magazine title offerings by selecting the Windows search charm, picking Zinio from the

context pop-up and then conducting a search. For the Windows Phone 8 platform, an

updated version of the Zinio app is available at qrs.ly/543ovky. And if you are running

Windows 7 or the Apple® OS X® operating system, Zinio’s classic desktop/notebook

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Offering broad support for Google® Android™ devices, the Zinio reader app for that

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If you are a fan of the SlideShare® platform, you can tune into the Dell Enterprise

channel there and get the latest from Power Solutions in an easily shareable form factor

at slideshare.net/dellenterprise. Lastly, look for more Power Solutions content to come

on Tech Page One, Dell’s multifaceted digital channel for original and curated news, blog

posts and articles at techpageone.com.

Editor’s comments

Channel surfing

Tom Kolnowski

Editor-in-chief and publisher

tom_kolnowski@dell.com

Follow usDell.com/powersolutions

zinio.com/powersolutions

twitter.com/powersolutions

techpageone.com

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

©2

013 D

ell In

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.

Dell high-performance computing and storage solutions keep markets moving. With next-generation infrastructure and services, Dell is helping the world’s leading fi nancial institutions securely and instantly disseminate hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of daily transactions. Making reliable real-time information as close as one can get to a sure thing on Wall Street. To see how we can help solve your most important business challenges, visit Dell.com/domore

How do you turn data from a billion trades

into a buying opportunity?

50140148-delltrades.indd 1 11/11/13 7:55 PM

8 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Recent citings

Recent

citings

“ This is our long-term

plan for corporate

social responsibility.

The 21 goals across

all aspects of social

and environmental

responsibility serve as

a road map for how

we build sustainability

into everything we

do through 2020

and beyond.”

– Michael Dell Chairman/CEO of Dell

October 2013

20/20 visionIf yours is like a lot of other businesses,

sustainability has become increasingly

important — to your operations, your

employees, your brand and your bottom

line. You may have heard various

organizations talking about social or

environmental benefits they have created,

and may be curious about how their actions

might affect you.

The Dell 2020 Legacy of Good Plan

is the company’s strategy for bringing

sustainability and business objectives

together. Through 21 goals related to the

environment, communities and people, the

plan helps accelerate successful outcomes

for customers and society.

Chief among these goals is the

company’s commitment to measure and

demonstrate the impact of its technology

and the ripple effect it can create in

customers’ hands. Dell customers are

creating a positive impact — potentially

10x greater than what it takes to create

and use Dell technology.

Built-in benefits: That’s what Dell is

after, to enable the world to do more

with technology while consuming less

energy — and accomplishing what was

never possible before. This goal is about

increasing the positives, not just reducing

the negatives.

The 2020 Plan is designed to benefit

Dell’s customers in several important ways:

• The Legacy of Good Plan is part of Dell’s

commitment to social and environmental

sustainability — not a one-off product

or service, but a part of everything the

company does.

• Dell is developing more efficient

products across its entire portfolio than

ever before. As an end-to-end provider,

the company can address any energy

bottlenecks to help ensure that the whole

system is efficient. Plus, this road map

helps IT decision makers plan effectively

for the future.

• Waste-free packaging helps de-clutter,

boost recycling rates and reduce tipping

fees associated with trash.

• By heightening traceability and

transparency throughout the supply

chain, Dell makes it easy for you to

feel confident that you have the insight

you need.

• Easy, convenient recycling options

from Dell help you dispose of obsolete

electronics responsibly.

• Dell’s goals to measure the environmental

value created by existing Dell solutions

help you better understand your

organization’s impact.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 9

Recent citings

Learn more

Dell 2020 Legacy of Good Plan:

dell.to/1fxq3YC

Security magazine awards:

qrs.ly/xn3oh6e

Driving social and environmental change

View this video to see how the Dell 2020 Legacy of Good Plan reflects the company’s vision for the future of sustainability and corporate responsibility at Dell.

bit.ly/GVoEgb

Enterprise security leadershipSecurity magazine, the leading publication for enterprise security executives and

the security industry, has named Michael Dell one of the Most Influential Security

Executives for 2013. This recognition comes as a result of Michael Dell’s leadership

in advancing enterprise security through Dell’s “converged, cored and connected”

strategy. Security magazine provides management-oriented content focusing on

enterprise security solutions, cybersecurity and more.

Dell’s go-private transactionDell announced the completion of its acquisition by Michael Dell, Dell’s founder, chairman

and CEO, and Silver Lake Partners, a leading global technology investment firm.

The transaction was approved by Dell’s stockholders at a special meeting of

stockholders held on September 12, 2013. The company has commenced the

process to delist its common shares from the NASDAQ Stock Market.

“Today, Dell enters an exciting new chapter as a private enterprise,” said Michael

Dell. “Our 110,000 team members worldwide are 100 percent focused on our

customers and aggressively executing our long-term strategy for their benefit.”

• Beyond its environmental efforts, Dell

strengthens communities through its giving

and volunteering goals. With its people

strategy, Dell aims to build a solutions-

oriented workforce that draws on its

diversity to deliver better outcomes.

To learn more about the plan, how you

can benefit from it or how you can become

a part of it, please visit Dell.com/2020.

Jup

iteri

mag

es/

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Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

10 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Perspectives

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

For the most part, businesses seek to

avoid risk. Leaders equate risk with

potential failure, so organizations have

morphed into hierarchical, fixed systems

to constrain variability within an acceptable range

that has narrowed progressively. As a result, in

recent years innovative ideas have been stifled

and entire industries have fallen into the death

spiral of cost- and price-cutting commoditization.

Enterprise IT is no different.

To respond effectively to the volatility,

uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity of today’s

business environment, IT leaders must take a

different tack. Looking at risk in totality, they

should question assumptions, challenge long-

held assertions, and recognize both the analytical

fallacies and less-than-perfect cognitive processes

currently in play. Now, instead of associating

risk with potential failure, IT leaders need to

equate calculated risk with innovation — meeting

marketplace demands, leapfrogging competition

and creating true economic profits beyond

financial engineering.

Risk factors

An essential aspect of innovation, risk requires

leaders to weigh all the potential benefits and

harms of one course of action over another.

Moreover, it calls for an important shift in focus,

as leaders balance positive potentials and stated

priorities to achieve desired outcomes instead

of avoiding potentially negative ones. Now, it is

imperative for IT decision makers to understand

and consider multiple risk factors and develop the

skills to address them effectively.

Decision risk. IT leaders must determine

whether to make a decision and the

consequences of not making a decision.

Decision risk can result from not challenging

common wisdom or reevaluating basic

business assumptions. Other factors leading

to decision risk include overly weighted

worst cases, invisible bureaucratic biases

and prejudicial framing (relative, absolute,

40 percent loss = 60 percent win).

Adoption risk. Several factors contribute to

adoption risk. For example, some organizations may

adopt technologies or respond to market, business

and technology trends too quickly or too slowly.

They may do so reactively or by overthinking,

and they may not consider nontechnical

implications or unintended consequences.

Execution risk. A wrong execution model or

poor execution can make a project run too long

and cost too much, leading to a loss of focus and

a reduction in value creation. Execution risk also

comes from inadequate consideration of an

organization’s energy, skills and policies to

accomplish the project.

Leadership risk. In his book “Thinking Fast

and Slow,” Nobel Prize–winning psychologist

Daniel Kahneman states, “For most people, the

By broadening their risk management outlook, IT leaders can spark remarkable innovation

and growth. Understanding six key truths helps decision makers overcome the fear of

failure and develop effective skill sets to achieve untold business results.

By Jim Stikeleather and Sanjib Sahoo

Calculating risk: What have you got to lose?

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 11

Perspectives

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

fear of losing $100 is more intense than

the hope of gaining $150.” IT leaders are

no exception. This loss aversion prevents

them from taking appropriate risks.

Identity risk. Many practices lead

to identity risk. Leaders may constrain

innovation to a known, specific

infrastructure or platform stack. They might

focus on project completion success rather

than value creation success or attend more

to technology issues than business issues.

Some may take psychological shortcuts

such as the illusion of knowledge, in which

familiarity hides ignorance, and the illusion

of truth, in which repetition substitutes

for evidence. Overconfidence is another

hallmark of identity risk.

Cultural risk. Having a failure-is-

unacceptable culture causes total risk

avoidance or an inability to cut losses

and walk away from a decision that

doesn’t work out — a trap of escalating

commitment to a losing course of action.

This type of culture prevents the wisdom

of learning from failure.

Reputation risk. The C-suite often fears

diluting its brand’s reputation, neglecting

what’s best in creating value for the business

or customers. Instead, the C-suite lets the

bureaucratic brand image — which mistakes

appearance for relationship, and form for

content — prevent experimentation.

Measurement risk. Sometimes leaders

fail to measure the real goal of innovation.

They focus on project progress rather than

created value. Or they turn management

measures into goals, which instigates

aberrant behavior.

Opportunity risk. Applying scarce

resources in one area of IT precludes

investment in another, which presents

the risk of missing an opportunity.

Inaction disguised as patience, as well

as impatience disguised as initiative, also

contributes to opportunity risk.

6 truths about failure

By understanding the various risk factors,

IT leaders can take risks that are better

calculated than before — as long as they bear

in mind these six key truths about failure.

1. The failure to take on value-adding

IT projects is worse than taking on IT

projects that fail.

Failing to deliver new capabilities to the

organization can be the most significant

risk controlled by IT. Almost half of IT

projects run over budget and about

56 percent deliver less value than

predicted.1 Fear of failure paralyzes many

IT teams into doing nothing. However, it

is not failed projects as much as projects

not taken on that can most influence the

future success of an enterprise. Research

from the Standish Group suggests higher

failure rates result in more total value

generated for the enterprise.2 Accept

failure; do not accept not trying.

2. A focus on acquiring gains leads

to better results than a focus on

avoiding losses.

Many new projects get hung up on the chance

of failure. Business and IT leaders need to view

the glass as half full — a 40 percent chance

of failure is a 60 percent chance of success.

The value of an IT investment must not be

based on its cost, but rather on its capability to

generate value to the organization. There is no

safe innovation, only varying risk and reward.

3. Preservation of past investments

delays value creation.

Businesses make irrational, fallacious

decisions on sunk costs — costs that

have already been incurred and cannot

be recovered. IT is particularly prone

to this practice when trying to force-fit

everything into a previously acquired

hardware or software platform, regardless

of its applicability to the problem being

addressed. Trying to preserve past

investments or force-fit capabilities into

unsuitable platforms delays value creation,

raises prospective costs unnecessarily and

creates applications that are not suitable for

actual use. Sunk costs don’t count.

4. Confusing leadership, governance

and management creates risk.

IT often fails to step up to its leadership role,

hiding behind what it identifies as alignment

1 Michael Bloch, Sven Blumberg and Jürgen Laartz, “Delivering large-scale IT projects on time, on budget and on value,” McKinsey & Company, www.mckinsey.com/insights, October 2012.

2 “CHAOS Tuesday #20: Project Success Versus Project Value,” panel discussion led by Jim Johnson, The Standish Group, August 27, 2013, blog.standishgroup.com/ct/428-ct20.

12 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Perspectives

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

with the business. This outdated thinking

can be disastrous. IT must lead by showing

how technology can be applied within the

IT group itself, and then by influencing and

guiding the organization in making the right

decisions and coming up with an innovative

implementation plan. Next, IT must direct and

restrain but not hinder the use of technology:

how it is developed, sourced and applied in

the best interests of the organization and its

stakeholders with appropriate governance

mechanisms. Lastly, IT must monitor and

manage the delivery and application of IT to

serve the organization, even if IT itself is not

the primary source of delivery. The risk of a

wrong decision is much less than the risk of

no decision.

5. Small IT failures provide great learning

opportunities.

The concept of learning from failures and

adjusting strategy during the process is called

failing forward. Risk doesn’t involve putting

all funding into a huge project only to watch

it crash and burn. Rather, IT leaders should

experiment by funding small innovation

projects — preferably of a non-mission-

critical nature. The lessons learned from

thinking big and starting small can be critical

for large projects down the road, helping IT

earn credibility when presenting a business

case for them. Don’t measure and punish

failure; measure and celebrate learning.

6. Failing fast and moving forward

is a big win.

If an IT project fails or a strategy must

change, failing fast helps prevent losing

big. Small, agile cycles of development

and risk assessment allow IT to easily

measure goals, evaluate success and

change execution strategy. Asset-light

models always beat capital investment until

a predictable scale is achieved. If the next

step needs a budget, it is too big a step.

Innovation through risk

By taking better calculated risks than ever

before, IT leaders help their organizations

achieve unprecedented success.

Companies with broader risk management

outlooks and practices outperform their

peers, according to a survey from Ernst &

Young.3 Apple, Amazon and Google are not

the only examples of risk-takers that create

transformational innovations.

For example, Dun & Bradstreet, known

for its insight on businesses, went a notch

ahead when it launched data as a service.

Even more impressively, the spin-off

Dun & Bradstreet Credibility Corp. totally

transformed and integrated its existing

technology platforms from several expensive

legacy systems into a single platform utilizing

software-as-a-service (SaaS), cloud and open

source technologies.

Netflix is another example of disruptive

innovation. The movie-by-mail program

was enhanced by the streaming option

in 2010, and the company slowly killed

its competition, including Blockbuster.

Interestingly, Netflix started with the simple

concept of eradicating late fees, even though

the move could have led to revenue loss.

In the financial industry, technological

innovation is almost dead. However,

tradeMONSTER, a small start-up founded in

2006, has become a leader in online trading

by taking risks, such as being the first browser-

based trading platform and the first HTML5

mobile trading platform. The company also

offers disruptive option trading tools based

on an open source trading platform.

What key similarity lies behind these

examples? Leadership overcomes fear

of failure by broadly balancing risks. The

result is groundbreaking innovation that

leads to business growth, strengthened

customer preference, industry recognition

and awards.

Authors

Jim Stikeleather is chief innovation officer for

Dell Services, where his team enables, facilitates

and accelerates advanced technologies, business

models and processes to address evolving

business, economic and social forces for Dell

and its customers.

Sanjib Sahoo is chief technology officer

of tradeMONSTER Group. He directs all

aspects of IT for its online retail brokerage

tradeMONSTER.com and its financial media

site optionmonster.com and masterminded

tradeMONSTER’s award-winning desktop and

mobile platforms.

3 “Turning Risk Into Results,” by Ernst & Young, 2012.

Dell is a trademark of Dell, Inc.

“ Instead of associating risk with potential failure, IT leaders need to equate calculated risk with innovation — meeting marketplace demands, leapfrogging competition and creating true profit.”

©2012 Schneider Electric. All Rights Reserved. All trademarks are owned by Schneider Electric Industries SAS or its affiliated companies. • 132 Fairgrounds Road, West Kingston RI • 998-4498_GMA-US

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Fast, easy, cost-effective deploymentSchneider Electric facility modules, which include a power unit and two types of cooling (water chiller or air) units, complement IT containers to give companies the complete infrastructure support they need to add capacity to existing data centers or to turn available space (e.g., former warehouses or manufacturing plants) into highly available, energy-effi cient, world-class data centers in just weeks. This scalable approach speeds up deployment, lowers costs, and simplifi es the build process. Accordingly, data centers can move at the speed of business at all times — with the fl exibility to adapt to future business needs.

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Today Tomorrow

Dell-Power-solutions_US_June1_p113v.indd 1 4/26/2012 9:58:21 AM

50120331-apc.indd 1 4/26/12 11:01 AM

14 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Perspectives

Ingrid Vanderveldt is an entrepreneur

and investor whose work focuses

on helping businesses access

innovative technology solutions that

solve real business problems. As Dell’s

first entrepreneur-in-residence (EIR),

Vanderveldt offers tools and resources

for growing businesses and connects

entrepreneurial start-ups with venture

capitalist funds. She helped launch

and now oversees the US$100 million

Dell Innovators Credit Fund and

the Dell Center for Entrepreneurs. Join

Vanderveldt in a candid conversation

about her ideas for helping Dell better

understand the needs of growing

businesses and how best to serve them.

How did the Dell EIR program

come about?

The early inspiration can be traced back

to a Dell Women’s Entrepreneur Network

(DWEN) event that I attended in China

in 2010. My friends and colleagues were

truly impressed that Dell would put

together an event with the sole purpose

of simply listening to entrepreneurs

and strategizing ways to help our

businesses grow.

After attending a second event the

following year, I had a big “aha” moment,

realizing all that Dell was doing to help

entrepreneurs around the world. I knew

that by teaming up with Dell, we could

create a win-win effort. After a meeting

with Dell executives, the idea for the

EIR position came to life. It’s now two

years later and I oversee entrepreneurial

initiatives globally for the company. It’s

been an amazing journey.

What are your responsibilities

as Dell’s EIR?

I serve as a voice for entrepreneurs

worldwide, essentially bringing the

outside in. We’re tackling the areas that

entrepreneurs struggle with the most,

which are access to technology and

networks, finding capital and navigating

the regulatory environment.

How do program initiatives

support your work?

One initiative was the launch of the Dell

Innovators Credit Fund, which provides

venture capital–funded and angel-

backed companies with the financial and

technological resources they need to

encourage innovation, improve speed

to market and bolster job creation.

Another initiative is the Dell Founders

Club, a hand-picked group of CEOs and

founders who see technology as critical

to the growth of their companies, have

immediate technology needs and are

looking to scale quickly.

We help these CEOs and founders

leverage technology to accelerate the

success of their companies. They can use

our credit fund to help pay for technology

infrastructure, freeing up their own funds

to hire marketing and sales people.

My team has also been clearing the

pathway to success by helping make it easier

for small and medium-sized businesses

to work with government. In partnership

Ingrid Vanderveldt, entrepreneur-in-residence at Dell, sparks the right mix of strategic

collaboration, technology innovation and funding to help upstart visionaries realize

their dreams — and large enterprises tap into the entrepreneurial mind-set.

Bridge builder

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 15

with the Dell Government Affairs team, we

have helped introduce federal- and state-

level legislation with the goal of easing the

constraining processes that may slow or

prohibit the growth of new businesses.

What role do technology innovation

and social media play in shaping

the entrepreneurial vision?

Providing the technology that entrepreneurs

need to be successful often starts with

mobility and the cloud — helping companies

acquire mobile technology and then getting

them onto a cloud-based platform they

can use to build and grow their businesses.

Social media is also a critical element of

this effort, because it is one of the least

expensive but most effective ways to get a

company’s message out there and empower

the entrepreneur’s vision.

DWEN is a perfect example. Dell started

leveraging social media as a way to listen

to entrepreneurs and understand women’s

challenges and opportunities well before the

inaugural 2010 DWEN event in Shanghai.

By merging in-person events with online

engagement, DWEN has since grown into

a powerful network that thrives offline and

connects like-minded women through social

platforms including LinkedIn and Twitter. This

global community of female entrepreneurs

in turn provides Dell with valuable insights on

how to enhance the products and services

Dell brings to its customers.

What do you and Dell have in store

for entrepreneurs in 2014?

A big step forward in our global expansion

was launching the Center for Entrepreneurs

in the United Kingdom. This important

development allows members of our EIR

programs to strategize, form business

relationships and connect with each other

in countries all over the world. We’re

looking forward to achieving great things in

the coming year.

Transforming the economics of successCompanies that participate in the Dell Founders Club offer many successful

examples of how innovative technology solutions can be used to bring about

positive change and catalyze business growth. Two cases in point are Eved and

Network Redux.

Advancing the event industry

Professionals in the meeting and event industry are increasingly challenged to

manage costs and still deliver extraordinary experiences. Eved helps meet these

goals by enabling event planners, hotels, meeting companies and suppliers to

interact and transact online. When Dell’s procurement team was tasked with

creating cost savings for company events, they looked for innovation within the

entrepreneurial community and found Eved. Dell is now an Eved customer —

the first large company to use Eved’s procure-to-pay solution, which is designed to

automate event industry purchasing and provide visibility into event category spend.

Managing IT around the world

Network Redux is a web hosting and data service provider that develops, deploys

and manages IT environments. The company was at a crucial juncture: Receive

more financing to meet new customer contract requirements and grow, or

decrease the contracts and experience plateaued revenues. Dell Financial

Services worked with Network Redux not only to provide financing to buy what

the company needed to grow, but also to act as a financial advisor. Today,

Network Redux is a thriving company with growing revenues and a brand new

office in India.

Dell is a trademark of Dell Inc.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

16 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Refreshing the client environment

can be its own reward, enabling

IT leaders to adopt innovative

technologies that help

their organizations gain a competitive

edge. Migrating to an updated OS

provides a golden opportunity for an

efficient hardware refresh, moving

to high-performance PCs with advanced

security capabilities.

A modern OS such as Windows 7 or

Windows 8 also can enhance security

with the latest malware protection and

ongoing updates. Moreover, Windows 8

adds optimized touch-screen support to

the Windows 7 code base, helping improve

productivity, collaboration and creativity

throughout a highly mobile workplace.

An added impetus for an OS upgrade

is the end of Microsoft support for

Microsoft® Windows XP on April 8, 2014.

For organizations that are still using

Windows XP, migrating to Windows 7

or Windows 8 is becoming an imperative.

In addition, latest-generation x86-based

processors do not support Windows XP.

Without security updates, hot fixes or support

options from Microsoft, IT departments are

likely to field an escalating number of service

calls related to Windows XP, leading to rising

internal support costs.

The advantages of migration are

clear. However, for midsized and large

enterprises, Windows migration can be

a complex undertaking that strains IT

resources. In fact, a survey of nearly 500

IT professionals revealed that 47 percent

of the respondents have not completed

their migrations off Windows XP.1 To meet

the deadline, many organizations need

to simplify, streamline and automate their

Windows migration. Dell offers services

and technologies designed to accelerate

the migration process.

It’s time to pull out the stops before Microsoft® Windows XP

support ends on April 8, 2014. Migration services from Dell

offer a holistic approach to fit any enterprise’s needs, whether

starting a new migration or fast-forwarding one in progress.

By Eugenio Soltero and Jefferson Raley

Preparing for a rapid, efficient Windows migration

1 “Migrating Away From Windows XP: A Survey of IT Professionals,” by Dimensional Research, sponsored by Dell, September 2013, qrs.ly/k43o6qm.

Full speed ahead

Having determined that it’s time to leave Windows XP behind, organizations can accelerate the migration process. See how modularized services from Dell help organizations speed a new or existing migration through best practices and expert guidance.

qrs.ly/e23o6q7

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 17

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Optimizing the stages of migration

Migration to Windows 7 or Windows 8

encompasses far more than OS deployment.

It also may consist of analyzing application

inventory readiness, migrating user

states, distributing software and patches,

virtualizing applications and performing

ongoing asset management.

An effective Windows migration

process can be broken down into five

stages (see figure):

1. Prepare applications: Take an inventory

of applications, test them for Windows 7

or Windows 8 compatibility and perform

remediation as necessary. Package the

applications for automated distribution

and management.

2. Engineer images: Build images for low-

or zero-touch deployment automation,

including the base OS, core applications

and security settings.

3. Design deployment: Engineer automated

loading of the OS image, applications, and

user data and settings — ideally, to enable

a fast and efficient migration in campus

environments and so that users who work

from home can execute the process

without any special skills or training.

4. Plan implementation: Create a

comprehensive plan for implementing

the migration, including conducting

site and user surveys, scheduling the

deployment for each site and configuring

project management tools.

5. Deploy OS: Migrate the systems, replace

PCs and peripherals as planned, conduct

any needed user training and manage

version changes moving forward.

Optimizing the timing and execution

of these stages helps ensure a fast,

smooth transition. Careful preparation

of applications, which includes taking

an application inventory and testing

applications for OS compatibility,

can take place at the same time that

the organization carries out image

engineering, design and planning tasks.

This concurrent scheduling, facilitated by

the right professional services and tools,

can shorten overall time to completion.

Capitalizing on professional services

Dell | Windows Migration Services offers

a holistic approach to migration that is

modularized to fit an organization’s needs

at any stage, whether the goal is to jump-

start a new migration or fast-forward one

already in progress. Projects can include

imaging and deploying new systems as

well as upgrading and re-imaging existing

systems. Services and tools from Dell help

reduce migration complexity and accelerate

time to completion while ensuring best

practices are followed:

• Image engineering: Experienced image

experts can create 32-bit and 64-bit

images based on an organization’s

requirements or Dell best practices based

on worldwide experience.

• Application inventory and rationalization:

Utilizing field-tested Dell tools, consultants

inventory an organization’s PCs, clean and

rationalize the inventory, and prepare the

application library for testing.

• Application compatibility testing:

Dell global application factories use Dell

ChangeBASE to test critical applications

for compatibility with the Windows 7

or Windows 8 image. Applications

are remediated and packaged for

automated installation.

• Deployment planning: IT decision

makers can work with a Project

Management Institute (PMI)–certified Dell

program manager or solutions architect

to build a comprehensive deployment

plan. Dell Client Deployment Manager

is a cloud-based tool used to track and

manage the migration.

• Dell Optimized Deployment Services:

Using patent-pending tools and

methodologies, Dell consultants help

organizations automate end-to-end PC

provisioning and deployment.

• Dell Managed Deployment Services:

Dell specialists work with IT managers

to execute their deployment plans, from

coordination of hardware orders and

management of the deployment process

to disposal of old PCs.

• Dell Asset Recovery and Recycling

Services: Dell handles the removal and

retirement of old computer equipment,

allowing organizations to concentrate on

supporting their end users.

• Dell Education Services: Training offerings

cover Microsoft technical and end-user

products as well as Dell computers, storage,

networking equipment and software.

A case in point is the University of Maryland

University College, which worked with Dell

to migrate new and existing computers

Prepare applications• Application inventory• Compatibility testing• Remediation• Package for automation

Plan deployment implementation• Site and user surveys• Scheduling• Configuration of project management tools

Engineer images• Base OS image• Core applications• Security settings

Design deployment• OS image load• Application load• User data and settings

Deploy OS• Zero-touch OS upgrades• PC and peripheral replacements• User training and support

Concurrent stages of a Windows migration

18 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

to Windows 7 quickly and efficiently, with

minimal downtime to staff services.2

Leveraging tools and automation

The pace of migration depends on having the

right tools and automation capabilities in place

to help remove potential roadblocks and speed

potentially time-consuming processes. One

of the top barriers to migration is application

compatibility. To overcome this roadblock, Dell

consultants use Dell ChangeBASE technology

to automate application compatibility testing,

remediation and packaging.

ChangeBASE sorts existing applications

by those that can be migrated and those

that can be virtualized, replaced or retired.

ChangeBASE also is designed to perform bulk

fixes of detected Windows 7 or Windows 8

application compatibility issues in much less

time than required for equivalent manual

operations. Some organizations purchase

ChangeBASE software to use post-migration

for ongoing application management needs.

Dell consultants can package applications

to ready them for automated OS installation

and de-installation using the Dell KACE K2000

Deployment Appliance, Microsoft® System

Center Configuration Manager or Microsoft®

Deployment Toolkit. An integrated system

provisioning solution, the KACE K2000

Deployment Appliance helps simplify a range

of systems deployment tasks, such as OS and

application provisioning, user migration, and

system repair and recovery.

To optimize the effectiveness of

ChangeBASE and the KACE K2000

Deployment Appliance, Dell consultants

use patented Dell technology to prepare

PCs for mass deployment while maintaining

user productivity. They can manage user

communications, resource planning, timelines

and reporting through the cloud-based Dell

Client Deployment Manager. In addition, the

Dell Automated Deployment tool provides

robust error handling and automation to key

tasks in the PC build and migration process.

Refreshing hardware

for expanded functionality

To leverage the enhanced functionality of an

upgraded OS, organizations can complement

their Windows migration with a PC refresh. Dell

has designed its latest devices — including

Dell OptiPlex desktops; Dell Precision

workstations; and Dell Latitude laptops,

Ultrabook™ systems and tablets — with next-

generation Windows operating systems in mind.3

By replacing outdated PCs with the latest models,

organizations can safeguard their data on

systems fortified with robust Dell Data Protection

solutions, which include comprehensive

encryption, advanced authentication and

leading-edge malware protection.

The latest Dell PCs feature the 4th

generation Intel® Core™ processor family,

which is designed to deliver embedded,

enterprise-ready security, remote

manageability, and enhanced performance

and power. Also, Dell PCs are equipped

with exclusive client systems management

technologies, including Dell extensions

for Intel® vPro™ technology that enable

an entire fleet of systems to be updated at

once, even when they are powered off.

Expediting a cost-effective migration

With the right resources, enterprises can

complete migrations to Windows 7 or

Windows 8 in a timely manner. Optimizing

the migration process and capitalizing

on professional services help speed

completion, reduce costs, ease downtime

and relieve pressure on IT staff.

As a single source of support for the

migration and deployment process, Dell

provides the powerful tools, methods and

services that organizations need to bring

control and consistency to the desktop

environment. Once the OS migration is

complete, the latest Dell PC offerings

enable enterprises to take advantage of

enhancements in processor performance,

power efficiency, data protection and

systems management that come with new

client devices.

Authors

Eugenio Soltero is a marketing manager at Dell

with several years of experience in end-user

computing solutions.

Jefferson Raley is a practice director for End

User Computing Consulting at Dell.

Learn more

Windows migration and PC deployment:

Dell.com/migration

Dell | Windows Migration Services:

Dell.com/migrationservices

Windows 8.1 for business:

Dell.com/XPMigration

2 For more information about how the University of Maryland University College migrated to Windows 7, see “Empowering faculty and staff with desktop technology refresh,” in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/y63o6qn.

3 For more information about PC refreshes, see “Zeroing in on the right devices for a client refresh,” by Christian Childs, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/pm3o6qo.

Dell, Dell Precision, ChangeBASE, KACE, Latitude and OptiPlex are trademarks of Dell Inc.

District-wide deployment

Pflugerville Independent School District needed to replace an outdated fleet of PCs — some reaching seven years in age — at schools across the district. View how the district worked with Dell to acquire and deploy over 2,000 PCs in three months.

qrs.ly/4g3ogen

Technology. It’s the driving force behind Formula 1®

racing. Caterham F1® Team relies on Dell technology, powered by Intel®, to design, build, test and race their cars around the world.

Learn more at teamdellracing.com

“Imagine a technology-driven business that needs to move to a new country every week. That’s my reality.”Antony SmithSr. IT Engineer, Caterham F1® Team

F1, FORMULA 1, FIA FORMULA ONE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP, GRAND PRIX and related marks aretrade marks of Formula One Licensing BV, a Formula One group company. All rights reserved.

50140147-dellf1.indd 1 11/14/13 4:58 PM

20 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

To maintain high levels of

productivity, enterprises need

PCs that can keep up with the

demands of a modern workplace.

However, many PCs used in organizations

today are more than three years old. As

they age, these systems start to incur high

maintenance costs and expose organizations

to heightened security risks.

At this point, IT decision makers should

consider refreshing their fleet of PCs to take

advantage of the latest technological advances

that help boost productivity, strengthen

security, streamline maintenance and lower

support costs. They need to carefully match

client computers to the requirements of the

workforce. In particular, a close examination

of the security, manageability and reliability

features offered by various options helps IT

leaders make informed decisions as they

formulate their client refresh plans.

Making the decision to refresh

Periodic refresh of an organization’s PCs

makes sense from both IT and business

perspectives. As warranties expire and

parts wear out from years of use, the

maintenance and support costs of outdated

PCs are likely to rise. In addition, aging

computers often lack built-in security

features necessary to protect against the

latest cyberthreats. Moreover, battery life in

old laptops may no longer meet the needs

and expectations of an increasingly mobile

workforce, limiting productivity.

Some organizations have delayed a

refresh, waiting for economic conditions to

improve. But now they may have another

urgent consideration: Microsoft is ending

support for the Microsoft® Windows XP

operating system and Microsoft® Office 2003

in April 2014, yet many organizations are

still using these products. In addition,

4th generation Intel® Core™ vPro™ processors

do not support Windows XP. As a result,

enterprises planning to migrate to the

Windows 7 or Windows 8 operating system

can maximize efficiency by refreshing

From aging hardware to expiring operating systems,

organizations are finding prime opportunities to refresh

their client fleet. Innovative Dell Latitude laptops deliver

secure, manageable and reliable features to meet today’s

enterprise requirements.

By Christian Childs

Zeroing in on the right devices for a client refresh

Meet the Latitude 7000 Series

In this video, see how the Dell Latitude 7000 Series Ultrabook packs outstanding enterprise-class performance into a sleek design.

qrs.ly/ru3n8xx

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 21

client hardware in conjunction with their

operating system update.1

Organizations also may be interested in

introducing devices with touch capabilities

into their client fleet, now that multi-touch

technology is supported by Windows 8.

Business-class touch devices help enhance

customer interaction, student engagement,

patient care and collaboration among

knowledge workers. Organizations planning to

deploy touch capabilities should take care to

select laptops with touch displays that provide

responsive control and withstand daily use.

For organizations seeking to capture

the benefits of the latest technology, Dell

has updated its line of Dell Latitude laptops.

The refreshed suite, comprising the Latitude

7000 Series, the Latitude 5000 Series and the

Latitude 3000 Series, is designed to address

the security, management and reliability

requirements of today’s dynamic workforce.

Evaluating client security features

To help organizations avoid risk and ensure

compliance, client devices and their data

should be protected by robust security

features. The security solutions must

safeguard data as it moves with end users

from device to device, without disrupting IT

processes or workforce productivity.

To help secure Dell Latitude laptops, Dell

offers multiple Dell Data Protection (DDP)

solutions for comprehensive encryption,

advanced authentication and leading-edge

malware prevention. (For more information, see

the sidebar, “Gaining the security advantage.”)

Dell Data Protection | Encryption

(DDP | E), which provides software-based

encryption of data stored on the system

drive and/or external media, is available as

a factory-installed option on Latitude 3000

Series, Latitude 5000 Series and Latitude

7000 Series models. DDP | E leverages

Intel® Advanced Encryption Standard New

1 For more information on Windows migration, see “Preparing for a rapid, efficient Windows migration,” by Eugenio Soltero and Jefferson Raley, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/la3n8yg.

Gaining the security advantageBecause information can be an organization’s most valuable asset, Dell provides

Dell Data Protection solutions to help safeguard data wherever it resides — on client

devices, mobile devices, external media or in cloud storage.

Dell Data Protection | Encryption is a suite of extensive encryption and data

protection solutions:

• Comprehensive protection: Offers flexible capabilities, including Microsoft® BitLocker®

management, full disk encryption and Federal Information Processing Standard

(FIPS) Publication (PUB) 140-2 Level 3 protection through the optional Dell Data

Protection | Hardware Crypto Accelerator.

• Enhanced end-user productivity: Delivers transparent, data-centric encryption

designed to incur negligible impact on performance, enabling end users to work

securely on any device, anywhere.

• Streamlined management: Provides a centralized remote management console

that is nondisruptive to the environment and designed to integrate with existing

authentication and systems management processes such as patch management.

• Easy compliance: Includes preset policy templates for fast compliance and

centralized management that help reduce the compliance workload by giving security

teams high visibility into access, usage and policy enforcement.

Dell Data Protection | Security Tools is an end-to-end solution that enables advanced

authentication options to help secure data access:

• Hardware authentication: Is designed to provide secure access control using

an optional contactless smart card reader or optional smart card and fingerprint

readers with FIPS PUB 201 certification.

• Integrated Trusted Platform Module (TPM): Helps securely store credentials with FIPS

PUB 140-2 certification and hardware credential processing for added protection.

• Centralized remote management: Enables administrators to manage user

credentials, passwords, encryption policies and multiple hardware authentication

methods remotely from a single console.

• Secure login: Supports Windows pre-boot login and single sign-on (SSO).

To help prevent potential breaches from malicious websites or applications, Dell Data

Protection | Protected Workspace takes an innovative approach to malware protection:

• Solid containment: Moves highly targeted applications into a virtualized

environment to help prevent malware from attacking the host operating system —

transparently to end users.

• Behavior-based detection: Identifies attacks based on behaviors and actions inside

the contained environment.

• Rapid prevention: Is designed to stop malware, dispose of the tainted environment

and restore a new, secure environment within 20 seconds.

Dell Data Protection solutions are available for Dell enterprise-class laptops,

workstations and desktops. These solutions enable end users to work as usual

without interruption or compromised performance.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

22 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

2 “Managing Clients With Dell Client Integration Pack 3.0 and Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2012,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell, September 2012, qrs.ly/823n8yi.

Latitude 3000 Series: Cost-effective laptops well suited for educational institutions and small and medium businesses

Instructions (Intel® AES-NI), designed to

accelerate disk encryption and decryption.

All Latitude models include Dell Data

Protection | Security Tools (DDP | ST) for

managing multifactor authentication.

Integrated authentication options include

fingerprint and smart card readers. Select

models are available with Dell ControlVault,

which adds another layer of hardware

security by isolating user credentials on a

separately controlled hardware chip. Also

available in select models is an embedded

Trusted Platform Module (TPM) with Federal

Information Processing Standard (FIPS)

Publication (PUB) 140-2 certification.

Latitude models include a one-year

subscription of Dell Data Protection | Protected

Workspace, which offers a proactive approach

to defeating advanced malware. The software

helps protect against untrusted content —

even advanced persistent threats (APTs) and

zero-day exploits — without interrupting

user workflow.

Streamlining management

Manageability is another key consideration

when selecting PCs for a refresh. Administrators

should be able to deploy client computers

quickly and manage them easily to help reduce

the time and IT resources required.

For efficient manageability, Dell

Latitude laptops include automated

client management tools that are tightly

integrated with Microsoft® System Center

software and Dell KACE appliances. This

integration helps speed deployment,

provide deep system inventory and health

monitoring, and streamline updates.

For example, driver installation

is a crucial part of operating system

deployment. Importing driver packages

takes 17 fewer steps using the Dell Client

Integration Pack compared to using native

Microsoft System Center Configuration

Manager (SCCM) tools, which translates to

approximately one hour of savings per PC in

driver package import time.2 Dell provides a

single customized file containing the drivers

needed for operating system deployment,

so administrators do not need to search

multiple websites for the right files.

Dell monitoring tools enable

organizations to collect comprehensive

inventory information, enforce policies and

maintain the health of Dell systems over

their lifetime. For example, the Dell Client

Integration Pack features Warranty Utility,

which allows administrators to retrieve Dell

warranty information for a list of systems

specified with their service tags.

In addition, Dell extensions for

Intel vPro facilitate exceptional control,

including remote BIOS management,

battery management and hard-drive wipe.

The Dell extensions, for instance, enable

one-to-many, out-of-band management

to update the entire client fleet at once,

even if the PCs are powered off — helping

reduce BIOS configuration time.

Enhancing system reliability

To evaluate reliability, organizations should

look for a focus on quality, including

premium materials, serviceable design

and extensive testing to help ensure a

consistent, reliable end-user experience.

Dell Latitude laptops are crafted using

strong materials and parts that are

designed to withstand the demands of an

on-the-go workforce: brushed aluminum,

reinforced magnesium alloy chassis,

Latitude 7000 Series: Premium Ultrabook systems with business-class security, management and performance

Latitude 5000 Series: Workhorse laptops offering balanced investment in mobility and productivity features

At a glance

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 23Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

steel hinges, woven carbon fiber, durable

powder-coated underside, spill-resistant

keyboards and LCD seals.

Latitude laptops also come armed with

Dell Strike Zone shock absorbers, Dell Fast

Response Free Fall sensors and a rubber

hard-drive isolator that work together to

protect the hard drive and its data. For

military-grade durability, Latitude laptops

have undergone rigorous third-party

testing to confirm that they meet stringent

MIL-STD 810G requirements. Additionally,

the touch screens of the Latitude 7000

Series and Latitude 5000 Series are made

from Corning® Gorilla® Glass NBT™ for

durability. This type of glass provides up

to 10 times higher scratch resistance

compared to soda lime glass, which is the

traditional material used in laptop screens.

Comparing updated laptops

The three series options of the refreshed

Dell Latitude portfolio span a variety of

organizational needs and budgets (see the

sidebar, “At a glance”).

Latitude 7000 Series

The slim, light Latitude 7000 Series Ultrabook™

system offers outstanding mobility, with a

12-inch-screen model starting at just 0.79 inch

(20 mm) thick and 2.99 pound (1.3 kg) in

weight. A 14-inch display is also available.

Powered by Intel Core i5 or i7 processors,

the Latitude 7000 Series is designed to

deliver up to 8.5 hours of battery life.

These sleek Ultrabook systems are built

to endure. Both use a Dell Tri-Metal chassis

for a strong foundation. The nontouch

models incorporate a durable aluminum

design with a soft-touch paint finish. The

touch models feature Corning Gorilla Glass

NBT and a strong, woven carbon-fiber

display back for added durability.

Dell has designed the Latitude 7000 Series

to be exceptionally secure and manageable.

Factory installation of high-level security tools,

such as DDP | E for software-based encryption

and DDP | Hardware Crypto Accelerator for

hardware-based disk encryption, is available

for the Ultrabook.

The Latitude 7000 Series offers several

advanced authentication options, including

fingerprint, FIPS PUB 201–certified smart

card and contactless smart card readers.

The Latitude 7000 Series also provides an

embedded FIPS PUB 140-2–certified TPM,

as well as Dell ControlVault for hardware-

based credential processing.

Management capabilities include

Intel vPro extensions, as well as automated

tools that integrate with Microsoft System

Center software and Dell KACE appliances.

Compatibility with Latitude E-family

docking enables seamless connection

with Dell monitors, wireless keyboards and

mice. Also available for the Latitude 7000

Series is an innovative Wireless Gigabit

(WiGig)–based dock, which lets end users

easily connect displays, audio and other

peripherals without cables.

Latitude 5000 Series

The Latitude 5000 Series is designed to

meet diverse workforce needs. It provides

a choice of 14-inch or 15-inch displays,

Intel vPro for manageability and a number

of security options, including DDP | E and

an embedded FIPS PUB 140-2–compliant

TPM. The Latitude 5000 Series also offers

dependable mobile productivity with Intel

Core i3, i5 or i7 processors for extended

battery life and a discrete graphics option

for expanded processing power and a high-

quality visual experience. Solid-state drive

(SSD) or high-performance solid-state hybrid

drive options are available.

Mobile broadband, Bluetooth® and

Wireless LAN capabilities provide mobility

and connectivity virtually anywhere. The

Latitude 5000 Series is also compatible

with Latitude E-family docking for easy

connectivity with Dell peripherals.

Latitude 3000 Series

Complementing the Latitude 7000 Series and

Latitude 5000 Series is the entry-level Latitude

3000 Series. This series offers the Dell Data

Protection suite of security options, Intel

Core i3 or i5 processors with Turbo Mode for

fast data processing, and a durable chassis

that has undergone highly accelerated life

testing for worry-free work and travel.

Organizations can choose from 14-inch

and 15-inch antiglare LCD displays for

comfortable visualization with optional touch

capability. Optional discrete graphics with up

to 2 GB video memory boost processing for

a high-quality visual experience. In addition,

an integrated microphone and high definition

(HD) webcam enable remote collaboration

and interaction.

Finding effective tools for the job

With the right combination of hardware,

software and services, organizations can

maximize the benefits of a client refresh

while driving down cost and complexity. The

updated Dell Latitude laptops are designed to

provide organizations of all sizes with secure,

manageable and reliable clients. Portfolio-

wide touch-display options help open up the

Windows 8 touch experience for end users.

As a single source for an organization’s

refresh needs, Dell also provides the essential

software, accessories and services end users

require for maximum system performance

and productivity in the office or on the go.

Author

Christian Childs is manager of the End User

Solutions Marketing for Commercial Business

team at Dell.

Learn more

Dell Latitude:

qrs.ly/kh3n8yk

Dell Data Protection:

Dell.com/DataProtection

Dell, ControlVault, KACE, Latitude, Strike Zone and Tri-Metal are trademarks of Dell Inc.

24 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Pervasive technological and social

trends, such as IT consumerization,

cloud computing and the

bring-your-own-device (BYOD)

phenomenon, are fundamentally changing

the way people work. Employees expecting

anytime, anywhere connectivity need

mobile yet powerful computers that enable

them to remain productive outside the

office. However, these devices must meet

enterprise security, manageability and

support requirements.

To enable users to work in the way that

most appeals to them, the Dell Venue 11

Pro tablet is designed to offer outstanding

flexibility, with the ability to convert into a

laptop or expand to a full desktop solution.

Enhanced operation and connectivity

The Venue 11 Pro runs a full 32-bit or 64-bit

Windows 8.1 operating system, making

the tablet an enterprise-ready option for

organizations considering migration from

the Microsoft® Windows XP operating

system.1 A range of Intel® processor options

enable PC-level performance and enhanced

manageability and security. (For more

information, see the sidebar, “Boosting

performance and efficiency.”)

Moreover, the Venue 11 Pro provides

several features that allow end users

to easily connect, access and share

information. The tablet is equipped with

a 10.8-inch Full HD in-plane switching

(IPS) display and high-end wireless video

technology to streamline video and

image sharing. The tablet also includes a

2 megapixel (MP) front-facing camera and

an 8 MP rear-facing camera. In addition,

the tablet is available with multiple WiFi

and mobile broadband options and

comes installed with Dell PocketCloud 2.0

software for easy access to data and

applications from a PC or smartphone.

Today’s on-the-go workforce seeks an optimal balance

of mobility and performance. The Dell Venue 11 Pro tablet

offers extreme flexibility by combining the power of an

Ultrabook™ system, the functionality of a desktop and the

portability of a tablet.

By Rich Nockels and Steve Gilbert

Staying connected for work-from-anywhere productivity

1 For more information on Windows migration, see “Preparing for a rapid, efficient Windows migration,” by Eugenio Soltero and Jefferson Raley, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/la3n8yg.

A day in the life

See the Dell Venue 11 Pro tablet in action, at home and at work.

youtu.be/06vXT40gKG0

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 25

Features

Boosting performance and efficiencyThe Dell Venue 11 Pro tablet is available

with multiple processor options, enabling

end users to tailor tablet performance to

their needs. Options include the quad-

core Intel® Atom™ processor, the Intel®

Pentium™ processor and 4th generation

Intel® Core™ i3 and Core i5 processors.

In particular, the 4th generation

Intel Core platform is designed to deliver

an optimal tablet experience, offering

exceptionally low power consumption

with outstanding PC-level performance.

Intel Core i5 with vPro™ provides the

ability for IT managers to remotely

manage and secure the Dell Venue 11

Pro, even if the tablet is powered off or

the operating system is inoperable.

Ultralow-power processor states

enable a significant reduction in power

consumption. Compared to previous

generations of Intel processors,

4th generation Intel Core processors

can bring a 50 percent improvement

in battery life during active workloads

and two to three times improvement in

standby battery life.a

The processors’

active-idle power state

allows the tablet to wake

from sleep in less than

three seconds, offering virtually instant-on

response.b Moreover, integrated HD

graphics in the 4th generation Intel Core

processor platform deliver outstanding

graphics processing performance — up

to double the 3D performance over

today’s fastest mobile Intel® HD Graphics

solutions c — to support gaming, HD

video processing and 3D graphics.

With up to 256 GB of internal solid-

state storage plus a micro Secure Digital

(microSD) slot for up to 64 GB of additional

storage, end users can take their data with

them for out-of-office productivity.

Exceptional versatility

Starting at approximately 1.5 pounds

(0.68 kg) and 0.39 inch (10 mm) thick,

the Venue 11 Pro is extremely portable.

Removing the plastic back cover reveals a

swappable battery for extended mobility.

Also, the Venue 11 Pro offers intuitive content

consumption as a handheld touch device

that supports Windows 8.

To heighten on-the-go productivity,

the tablet can shift easily to a laptop form

factor. For example, it can be docked

into the Dell Tablet Keyboard Mobile,

which includes a full-sized keyboard and

built-in rechargeable battery. Another

option is the Dell Tablet Keyboard Slim,

a folding magnetic stand with a super-

thin, lightweight keyboard that doubles

as a cover. An optional Dell Active Stylus

allows users to easily annotate, draw or

take notes.

To maximize productivity at the desk, the

Dell Tablet Dock converts the Venue 11 Pro

into a powerhouse that supports up to two

displays. The dock provides a simple stand for

the tablet and includes an array of ports that

lets users easily connect keyboards, mice,

monitors, speakers and other peripherals.

Enterprise-class security and service

The Venue 11 Pro combines the level of

performance, design and responsiveness

end users desire while giving IT departments

what they need — the ability to integrate

easily and securely into an existing

Windows environment. The Venue 11 Pro

includes hardware and software security

enhancements such as an embedded Trusted

Platform Module (TPM), an optional biometric

reader and Dell Data Protection security tools.

To support enterprise tablet adoption

needs, Dell offers a broad portfolio of

services for the Venue 11 Pro. From IT

support to application development,

Dell Services provides customizable

and highly manageable solutions to

help enterprises reduce complexity and

enhance user productivity.

Three devices in one for

flexible connectivity

Mobile employees need to stay productive

wherever work takes them. The Dell Venue 11

Pro, backed by Intel processor technology,

delivers leading-edge performance with a

compact, versatile design that makes it easy to

stay connected on the road or in the office.

Authors

Rich Nockels is a marketing engineer at Intel,

focusing on the business client/tablet market

space for the past 13 years.

Steve Gilbert is a senior manager for messaging

and sales enablement at Dell. He is also a social

media writer and blogger for Dell on the topics of

mobility, tablet solutions and BYOD.

Learn more

Dell Venue tablets:

Dell.com/tabletsDell, PocketCloud and Venue are trademarks of Dell Inc.

a,b,c “ 4th Generation Intel® Core™ Ushers New Wave of 2-in-1 Devices,” Intel Newsroom, June 3, 2013, qrs.ly/6l3osqv.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

26 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

University of Maryland University College

(UMUC) became one of the first

universities in the United States to offer

online degree programs. Since then, it has

delivered degree-level courses to tens of thousands

of students — from working professionals to single

mothers to servicemen and women — allowing them

to pursue a college degree while maintaining their

busy lives. Today, UMUC has the largest enrollment

of any public university in the United States, serving

more than 93,000 students worldwide.

UMUC operates a large, distributed IT

infrastructure that includes thousands of desktops

used by faculty and staff for student education,

both face-to-face and online. With support ending

for the university’s desktop operating system,

Microsoft® Windows® XP, and with legacy devices

struggling to support the latest software, UMUC

sought a far-reaching desktop refresh.

Ivey Butler, senior director for client

relationship management and a project lead at

UMUC, says, “We needed to standardize and

upgrade our desktop environment based on the

latest hardware and Microsoft software to help

staff increase their productivity and reduce our

support workloads and costs. As an additional

challenge, we needed to deliver our desktop

transformation extremely quickly to ensure the

required funding would still be available, while

minimizing the risk of disruption to critical staff-

and student-facing services.”

UMUC selected Dell to upgrade its desktops.

Beulah Daniel, director of IT customer support

at UMUC, says, “We have had very positive

experiences working with Dell in the past, giving

us confidence they could help us through every

stage of our planned desktop renewal. Having a

single point of contact for desktop consultancy,

procurement, integration and migration

meant we could deliver our project faster and

more efficiently with Dell, and with less risk of

downtime and disruption.”

In preparation for migration to Windows 7,

UMUC replaced 800 legacy desktops and laptops

with 300 Dell OptiPlex 9010 desktops, 470 Dell

Latitude E6330 laptops and 30 Dell XPS 13 L322x

Ultrabook™ systems. The remaining 300 Dell

desktops in UMUC’s stateside fleet had sufficient

storage and processing power to support

Windows 7. However, to streamline desktop

management and support and provide a great

user experience, these needed to be migrated to

the same standardized Windows 7 images that

would be used for UMUC’s new Dell systems.

Accelerating migration

with plug-and-play deployment

To migrate its new and existing workstations to

Windows 7, UMUC worked with Dell Infrastructure

Consulting Services and Dell | Windows Migration

Services. The Dell team used the Microsoft®

Deployment Toolkit and Dell Optimized Deployment

technology to produce Windows 7 images for

six models of Dell workstations and laptops. It

then created automated installation procedures

for 10 application profiles, each designed to

meet the specific application needs of different

groups of faculty and staff across the university.

University of Maryland University College boosts faculty and staff

productivity by working with Dell to refresh outdated computers

and migrate to a standardized Windows 7 environment.

University of Maryland University College

Empowering faculty and staff with desktop technology refresh

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 27

Features

UMUC and the Dell | Windows Migration

Services team deployed the images on new

and existing computers. This process, which

took a total of seven weeks, included a pilot

installation of several workstations at a test

site, followed by phased implementations of

hundreds of Dell endpoints at four UMUC

sites. All new systems came from the Dell

factory preloaded with the required Windows 7

images and application packages, making

plug-and-play deployment possible — end

users averaged only 30 minutes of downtime

during installation.

The university is now benefiting from the

capabilities of Dell systems. “We can push

out updates to Dell desktops and laptops

even when they are turned off, helping us

manage our desktop estate more easily and

stay compliant with patching requirements,”

says Daniel. “We also get an extra layer of

security with Dell Data Encryption, which

further protects our sensitive data.”

Additionally, says Butler, “Machines boot

up faster now, and our Microsoft® Office and

other applications run faster on Windows 7

and the Dell hardware. We can also provide

enhanced performance for multimedia voice

and video applications and other processor-

intensive applications that just weren’t widely

used before.”

Maximizing uptime and user satisfaction

After upgrading its desktop environment,

the number of help desk requests has

fallen, and the volume of calls related

to hardware failures has dropped

significantly. “That means we can spend

more time supporting the users who really

need help, responding more quickly to

their requests, minimizing downtime and

fostering better relationships between the

IT organization and our faculty and staff

customers,” says Butler.

The IT team can also spend more

time training users on the intricacies of

the new applications. “Where we used to

spend time addressing hardware issues,

our new systems from Dell allow us to

extend people’s knowledge of their desktop

applications and help them increase their

productivity,” says Butler.

By increasing application performance

and uptime, and dedicating more time to

application-level support and training, the

UMUC IT team has been able to heighten

user satisfaction across the university. “Since

the migration to new Dell systems and

Windows 7, we sent out a questionnaire to

gauge end-user satisfaction with their new

desktops and the support they’ve received,”

says Daniel. “Overall, the feedback has

been excellent. The vast majority of staff

members are either very satisfied or satisfied

with their desktop services. This marks a

welcomed improvement over the previous

desktop experience.”

“ Where we used to spend time addressing

hardware issues, our new systems from Dell

allow us to extend people’s knowledge of their

desktop applications and help them increase

their productivity.”— Ivey Butler

Senior director for client relationship management and project lead at UMUC

October 2013

Dell, Latitude, OptiPlex and XPS are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

28 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Many enterprises are coming

to rely on mission-critical,

I/O-intensive applications that

are driving the requirement

for high-performance storage with

ultrafast response times. For example,

the rising adoption of server virtualization

has produced an increase in random I/O

access patterns, which stresses rotating

disk media. In addition, the pervasiveness of

multi-core processors has led to heightened

demand for high I/O throughput per server.

Moreover, expectations of anywhere,

anytime access to information with low

latency from any device are straining

storage performance.

At the same time, an explosive growth

of unstructured data fuels the need for

cost-effective, high-capacity storage.

These escalating requirements leave IT

managers looking for storage that can

efficiently handle both hot and cold

data — at the right price point. Many

organizations are finding that traditional

hard disk drive (HDD) storage can no

longer efficiently address the demands of

mission-critical workloads. As one of the

last remaining mechanical devices in the

server-to-storage data path, spinning disks

in HDD-based storage systems introduce

rotational and seek latencies that limit

application performance.

Flash solid-state drive (SSD) storage

offers a compact high-performance

alternative. Because it contains no moving

parts, flash storage is not subject to the

mechanical limitations of HDDs, meaning

that it is able to deliver outstanding

random I/O performance and ultralow

Expediting workload performance with flash storage

Flash storage boosts the real-time responsiveness of

applications running highly transactional, I/O-intensive

workloads. Dell Compellent Flash-Optimized solutions

are designed to deliver the speed of flash at the capacity

and price of rotating disk.

By Jeremy Garner and John Mannix

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 29

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

latency. Flash storage can deliver a large

performance boost when used for highly

transactional, I/O-intensive workloads —

especially those with small block sizes and

random I/O, such as online queries, batch

processing, retail transactions, business

analytics and peak-time virtual desktop

infrastructure (VDI) logins. Flash-based

arrays also enable many more I/Os per

second (IOPS) to be packed into a smaller

footprint than comparable HDD-based

systems while using less power.

Although the benefits of flash storage

are clear, for many organizations cost is

a major barrier to its broad adoption. IT

decision makers considering a storage

purchase must balance cost, performance

and capacity requirements. Flash storage

has traditionally been more expensive

per gigabyte than HDD technology,

keeping it relegated primarily to select

high-priority workloads.

Tailoring storage

for specific workloads

Dell Flash-Optimized Storage solutions

introduce flash at the price of disk,1

opening up the use of flash to a broad

range of workloads. Dell Flash-Optimized

Storage solutions combine the speed of

flash SSDs with the cost-effective capacity

of HDDs. Flash-optimized solutions in

the Dell Compellent family are the first in

their class to automatically tier data from

write-intensive single-level cell (SLC)

SSDs to lower-cost, read-intensive multi-

level cell (MLC) SSDs and traditional

rotating disks.2

Compellent all-flash and hybrid-flash

configurations offer a choice of SSD and

HDD types, addressing diverse enterprise

workloads and price points. An all-flash

configuration comprises one or more Dell

Compellent SC220 flash enclosures and

provides two tiers of storage with both

read- and write-intensive SSDs. A hybrid-

flash solution provides three tiers of storage

and can be configured using one or more

Compellent SC220 flash enclosures with

both write- and read-intensive SSDs and

HDDs, plus the option to expand capacity

using additional enclosures with 7,200 rpm,

10,000 rpm or 15,000 rpm HDDs. (For more

information, see the sidebar, “Matching

storage to meet performance demands.”)

The mix of drive types in Dell

Compellent Flash-Optimized solutions

enables a dramatic reduction in cost per

gigabyte. These solutions offer up to an

approximate two times price advantage

over competitive hybrid solutions, and up to

an approximate five times price advantage

over competitive all-flash solutions.3

Optimizing performance

with automated tiering

Built-in Dell Compellent Data Progression

software automates the process of matching

workloads with the optimum storage

media and RAID levels (see figure). Based

on actual usage patterns, Data Progression

can determine whether a block is heavily

accessed and how often access typically

occurs. If a block is heavily used, Data

Progression automatically moves that block

to high-performance storage. Less active

blocks are migrated to cost-effective, high-

capacity storage. The automated tiering

capability of Data Progression streamlines

storage management.

Two storage profiles are available for

performance-sensitive data volumes that

are managed within a flash-optimized

environment. Although these profiles are

intended to support typical enterprise

requirements, administrators should evaluate

their suitability for specific workloads.

The Flash-Optimized storage profile

directs writes to high-performance RAID-10

tier 1 storage comprising write-intensive

SLC SSDs. Data Progression automatically

identifies reads, converts read-intensive

data to RAID-5 and places it on MLC SSDs

in tier 2, keeping tier 1 free for incoming

writes. All volumes associated with the

Flash-Optimized storage profile have the

write cache disabled by default.

The Low Priority storage profile, which

is available for hybrid-flash configurations,

can be used to assign certain workloads

1 The Dell Compellent all-flash solution costs less than a comparable 15,000 rpm disk drive solution based on internal Dell analysis in July 2013 using Dell Compellent flash-optimized and spinning disk U.S. list pricing.

2 Based on internal Dell analysis performed in May 2013, comparing similar Dell Compellent offerings to EMC® VNX® Family, HP® 3PAR StoreServ, HP EVA, IBM® Storwize® V7000, IBM XIV®, Hitachi Data Systems® HUS 100 Family and Oracle® Sun® ZFS Storage Family.

3 Competitive U.S. list pricing from Gartner Inc, CP Storage, as of June 2013. Market price calculated assuming a discounting of approximately 50 percent for all competitive systems and Dell Compellent.

Tier 2

Read-intensiveSAS SSD

Tier 1

Write-intensiveSAS SSD

Tier 3

SAS disk drives7,200, 10,000or 15,000 rpm

RAID-10

RAID-5

RAID-5 RAID-6

RAID-6

RAID-6

Automated data tiering by Dell Compellent Data Progression

30 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

to the rotating disks of tier 3, with writes

as RAID-10 and snapshots as RAID-6. Write

cache is enabled for volumes associated

with the Low Priority profile.

Data Progression allows enterprises to

take advantage of the key benefits of SLC

and MLC SSD drives, as well as capacity-

optimized spinning drives, to optimize

performance and price for an advantageous

total cost of ownership (TCO).

Changing the economics of flash

To accommodate the rapid growth in

data volumes and diversity of application

workloads, enterprises require flexible,

scalable storage systems that address the

varied demands of each application and

align with IT cost requirements. Flash has

emerged as a storage medium that can

handle high I/O workloads, particularly the

random I/O access patterns caused by

virtualized applications.

By keeping hot data on high-

performance flash drives and cold data

on high-capacity HDDs, enterprises can

optimize performance for data-intensive

workloads without straining budgets or

sacrificing capacity. In Dell Compellent Flash-

Optimized solutions, Dell has combined the

power of automated tiering with the speed

of flash technology in a way that drives

down costs while boosting performance.

Matching storage to meet performance demandsBecause applications and environments have specific

performance requirements, IT managers need flexible storage

options to accommodate diverse workloads. Dell Compellent

storage is designed to address multiple performance levels and

maximize the value of storage (see figure).

For example, Compellent all-flash solutions are well suited

for business-critical workloads, which typically require high I/Os

per second (IOPS) and quick response. With large-capacity

flash storage that is designed to deliver both scalability and

low latency, Compellent all-flash solutions are appropriate

for online transaction processing (OLTP), virtual desktop

infrastructure (VDI) gold images and big data analytics.

Alternatively, general workloads call for both high-

capacity storage and mainstream application performance.

In this scenario, Compellent hybrid-flash solutions provide

limited flash capacity that enables application performance

to be dynamically increased for selected workloads, while

cold or infrequently accessed data can reside on capacity-

optimized HDDs.

Compellent storage is also available in HDD-based

configurations. With large capacity and the lowest available

cost per gigabyte compared to all-flash and hybrid solutions,

these cost-optimized solutions are suitable for applications

with large data sets, such as backup and archive.

Compellent storage configurations that help align storage performance with workload requirements

Write-intensiveand read-intensiveSSDs

7,000 rpmHDDs

Hybrid for general workloadsCapacity with mainstream application performance

Write-intensiveand read-intensiveSSDs

All-flash for business-critical workloadsLarge-capacity flash with low latency and scalability

15,000 rpmHDDs

7,000 rpmHDDs

Cost-optimized, HDD-based for lowest $/GBLarge capacity, lowest $/GB

Authors

Jeremy Garner is a campaign manager for

enterprise in the Dell Global Marketing Group. He

has over 15 years of experience in the IT industry

working with small and medium businesses as

well as large institutions.

John Mannix is a product marketing manager

for storage in the Dell Enterprise Solutions

Group. He has over 20 years of experience with

IT systems and was previously with Cirrus Logic,

Hyperformix and Gemalto.

Learn more

Dell Flash-Optimized Storage solutions:

Dell.com/compellent

Dell, Compellent and Data Progression are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 31

Continuous growth in the volume

and complexity of data from diverse

applications and private cloud rollouts

has intensified the need for robust

storage that is easy to use and manage. While IT

decision makers face escalating requirements for

storage capacity and performance, their IT staff may

already be overtasked and budgets constrained. At the

same time, many organizations lack IT administrators

with specialized storage expertise.

To help meet these challenges, the latest

generation of Dell EqualLogic arrays is designed

to optimize storage performance, efficiency and

management. Dell is also updating the EqualLogic

FS7600 and EqualLogic FS7610 network attached

storage (NAS) appliances with version 3 of Dell

Fluid File System (FluidFS). Moreover, the Dell

SupportAssist functionality in EqualLogic SAN

Headquarters (SAN HQ) v3.0 has been enhanced

to boost administrator productivity.

Challenges of virtualization

Many different factors put pressure on IT

organizations to make sure storage resources meet

today’s real-world demands. In particular, the rapid

growth of unstructured data calls for efficient storage

management of emerging data types. IT leaders are

looking to deploy additional storage to meet this

growth without intensifying administrative overhead.

Meanwhile, the steady march toward

virtualization in data centers is driving increasingly

concentrated server environments. Today’s multi-

core servers are designed to handle a mix of

different workloads as organizations combine

diverse applications onto fewer physical servers

than before. However, virtualization consolidates

not only processing but also I/O.

The combined workloads present a concentrated

blend of randomized I/O to a consolidated storage

infrastructure, which can lead to degraded

storage performance on traditional, frame-based

architectures. For example, an organization in the

healthcare industry might need to simultaneously

manage a high volume of MRI images, store patient

records and other electronic documents, and meet

stringent retention requirements — resulting in a

mix of workloads with different requirements from

a storage standpoint. Organizations need storage

The steep increase of data quantities and workload

diversity in virtualized environments requires storage

that can keep up. The latest generation of Dell

EqualLogic storage helps organizations meet the

challenge while minimizing management complexity.

By Achmad Chadran, Dylan Locsin and Jeff Junker

Boosting storage performance and efficiency for diversified workloads

Performance and efficiency simplified for the real world

Unlock the power of flash and 10 Gigabit Ethernet with the

next-generation Dell EqualLogic PS6210 Series storage array.

• High-performance, cost-effective flash storage helps

reduce latency for demanding applications.

• Exceptional throughput boosts performance for

sequential workloads.

• Performance and capacity can be scaled linearly while

avoiding disruption.

• Day-to-day management is streamlined with automated

data protection, tiering and workload balancing capabilities.

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.32 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

systems with the performance to meet

these workload challenges while making it

simple to expand capacity on demand and

balance the load among storage resources

for maximum efficiency.

Intelligent storage

for virtualized environments

EqualLogic virtualized storage is

designed to simplify operations by

abstracting multiple storage processes

and components to let administrators

manage at the resource-pool level instead

of at a disk or RAID level. The latest

EqualLogic releases retain key features and

characteristics that have become hallmarks

of the storage family, such as automated

load balancing and tiered storage for

perpetual self-optimization; scale-out

architecture to support on-demand, just-

in-time expansion; and integrated storage

area network (SAN) and NAS management

for enhanced productivity.

Built-in intelligence helps lower the skills

barrier for storage management, in line

with the emergence of the generalist role

in IT organizations — team members tasked

with managing and understanding end-to-

end systems from servers to networking to

storage. In addition to these capabilities,

the latest EqualLogic releases enable the

performance and efficiency enhancements

that organizations need today.

Scalable storage performance

The widespread use of flash solid-state

drives (SSDs), alone or in hybrid arrays, has

strained the performance capabilities of

storage system controllers on traditional SAN

systems. Controllers can be hard-pressed

to keep up with the high throughput of

SSDs, so the storage system may fail to fully

leverage the SSD speed advantage.

Moreover, overall performance can

suffer. Because traditional scale-up storage

systems with fixed dual-controller designs

are often challenged to support growing

numbers of SSDs, other workloads and

drives within the same array may be

deprived of their processing resources.

In contrast, the scale-out EqualLogic

architecture enables organizations to rapidly

obtain additional processing performance,

capacity, throughput and bandwidth by

simply deploying another EqualLogic array

in the storage pool. This scale-out capability

helps organizations handle the performance

demands of SSDs and minimize I/O

bottlenecks as workloads grow.

The latest-generation EqualLogic

PS6210 Series arrays feature a redesigned

controller that is optimized to support

much higher I/Os per second (IOPS) and

throughput than the previous generation.

The flash-based EqualLogic PS6210 Series

arrays have demonstrated up to three

times the maximum IOPS compared to

prior-generation EqualLogic arrays and

significantly higher IOPS when scaled out

in large groups. (For more information on

EqualLogic PS6210 Series performance, see

the sidebar, “Raising the bar.”)

Additionally, the EqualLogic PS6210

Series arrays allow Dell to offer EqualLogic

flash-based solutions at the price of hard

disks. For instance, for a 30,000 IOPS online

transaction processing (OLTP) database

workload requiring 10 TB of usable space,

an EqualLogic PS6210S flash array can

outperform four EqualLogic PS6210XV

15,000 rpm disk arrays at a lower cost.1

The EqualLogic PS6210 Series have

two active 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE)

ports per controller; in comparison,

the previous generation of controllers

supported one port. The latest controllers

can drive up to approximately 2 GB/sec of

throughput per array for heavy sequential

large-block workloads.2

The latest generation of controllers

runs EqualLogic PS Series array software

v7, which features a 64-bit kernel for the

array’s operating system. The 64-bit kernel

enables the array to take advantage of the

controller’s additional memory and cache

to speed up system operations, as well as

support technology updates in software.3

Crucially, the EqualLogic PS6210

performance enhancements do not lead to

extra complexity in storage management.

Administrators can easily incorporate

EqualLogic PS6210 Series arrays into

existing EqualLogic SANs to grow capacity

and throughput. When all EqualLogic arrays

are upgraded to the same array software

release, the addition of each array to an

existing pool — which may contain multiple

generations of EqualLogic storage — is

designed to trigger an automatic rebalance

of all the arrays in the pool. Administrators

can also create a new pool, such as one

comprising only flash-based EqualLogic

PS6210 Series arrays, and shift over existing

volumes and workloads.

Policy-based data reduction

As part of its coordinated set of releases,

Dell also has updated FluidFS to help

organizations boost efficiency while

simplifying operations. FluidFS v3 powers

the EqualLogic FS7600 and EqualLogic

FS7610 NAS appliances, enabling enterprise-

class file storage to scale beyond the file

system and file share capacity limits of

conventional file systems.

With FluidFS v3, the EqualLogic family

now incorporates Fluid Data Reduction, a

policy-driven, variable block deduplication

and compression technology that helps

1 Based on November 2013 Dell internal analysis of US list pricing, technical specifications and performance testing when comparing the EqualLogic PS6210XV and EqualLogic PS6210S arrays with 70/30 read/write random workload and 8 KB block size. System comparisons will vary depending on the workload and configuration.

2 Performance may vary depending on the workload and drive type. Based on September 2013 Dell performance testing comparing the EqualLogic PS6210XS and EqualLogic PS6110XS arrays with sequential 1 MB block read I/Os.

3 EqualLogic PS Series array software v7 also supports a 32-bit kernel for certain previous-generation array models that cannot support the 64-bit kernel.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 33

Raising the barIn September 2013 at Dell Labs, Dell engineers tested the

performance of the EqualLogic PS6210 Series arrays. One of

the models tested was the EqualLogic PS6210XS, a hybrid flash

array that is designed to increase performance by providing

twice the solid-state drive (SSD) capacity of an earlier-generation

hybrid model.

Results indicated that the EqualLogic PS6210XS array delivered

substantially higher random I/O performance than the EqualLogic

PS6110XS array (see figure):

• Approximately three times the 100 percent–random read

workload performance with one-third the latencya

• More than two times the simulated online transaction

processing (OLTP) database workload performance with less

than half the latencyb

Moreover, one pool comprising eight EqualLogic PS6210XS arrays

was able to scale to 1.2 million I/Os per second (IOPS) during testing.c

In tests of sequential read and write performance, a single

EqualLogic PS6210XS array demonstrated more than twice

the simulated decision support system (DSS) query and load

performance with less than half the latency, compared to a single

EqualLogic PS6110XS array (see figure).d

a Performance may vary depending on the workload and drive type. Based on September 2013 Dell performance testing comparing the EqualLogic PS6210XS and EqualLogic PS6110XS arrays with 4 KB block and 100 percent random read I/Os.

b Performance may vary depending on the workload and drive type. Based on September 2013 Dell performance testing comparing the EqualLogic PS6210XS and EqualLogic PS6110XS arrays with 4 KB block and 70/30 read/write random I/Os.

c Performance may vary depending on the workload and drive type. Based on September 2013 Dell performance testing using eight EqualLogic PS6210XS arrays with Dell PowerEdge R620 and PowerEdge R610 servers and Dell Networking switches, under 100 percent read workloads.

d Performance may vary depending on the workload and drive type. Based on September 2013 Dell performance testing comparing the EqualLogic PS6210XS and EqualLogic PS6110XS arrays with sequential 1 MB block read I/Os and sequential 64 KB block write I/Os.

Comparison of single-array sequential I/O performance

Comparison of single-array random I/O performance

3.0

2.5

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0

Re

lati

ve IO

PS

EqualLogic PS6110XS EqualLogic PS6210XS

IOPS

Latency

Platform

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

Late

ncy

(m

s)

Random 4 KB 100 percent read I/Os

2.0

1.5

1.0

0.5

0

Re

lati

ve IO

PS

EqualLogic PS6110XS EqualLogic PS6210XS

IOPS

Latency

Platform

18

16

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0

Late

ncy

(m

s)

Random 4 KB 70 percent read/30 percent write I/Os

2,500

2,000

1,500

1,000

500

0

Th

rou

gh

pu

t (M

B/s

ec)

EqualLogic PS6110XS EqualLogic PS6210XS

Throughput

Latency

Platform

35

30

25

20

15

10

5

0

Late

ncy

(m

s)

Sequential 1 MB block read I/Os

1,000

900

800

700

600

500

400

300

200

100

0

Th

rou

gh

pu

t (M

B/s

ec)

EqualLogic PS6110XS EqualLogic PS6210XS

Throughput

Latency

Platform

9

8

7

6

5

4

3

2

1

0

Late

ncy

(m

s)

Sequential 64 KB block write I/Os

34 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

decrease the capacity needed for common

enterprise data by 48 percent.4

After files are written to an EqualLogic

FS Series appliance, they are deduplicated

in accordance with criteria set in

administrator-defined policies. When a

file is modified, FluidFS rehydrates only

the portion of the file with write activity,

minimizing I/O.

File data can be compressed after

deduplication. Fluid Data Reduction

implements the Level Zero Processing System

(LZPS) compression algorithm, which is

designed to use minimal processor resources.

FluidFS v3 also helps improve scalability

by enabling each EqualLogic FS Series

appliance to manage up to 10,000 active

Server Message Block (SMB) sessions at the

same time. Along with SMB v2 and SMB

v2.1, Fluid FS v3 supports version 4 of the

Network File System (NFS) protocol, which

heightens storage efficiency by minimizing

internal messaging among subcomponents.

Together, these capabilities enable

organizations to increase storage density,

ultimately helping to reduce the cost of storage.

Enhanced operational efficiency

EqualLogic PS Series array software

v7 includes updates to EqualLogic

Group Manager to streamline storage

management. For example, support for

access control policies helps simplify

ongoing management of clustered

and medium-to-large virtual server

environments. Administrators can

set policies for access and reuse these

policies for multiple hosts, instead of

re-creating traditional access control

lists (ACLs) for each host and volume —

helping free up time for IT staff and

avoid error-prone operations.

Management is also streamlined thanks

to a revamped graphical user interface (GUI)

that now includes search capabilities.

The EqualLogic Group Manager GUI

incorporates the Dell Clarity E style, an

approach that applies current principles

of usability, readability and graphic design

consistently across Dell GUIs.

Additionally, the updated array software

supports 4,096-byte, or 4K, sector volumes

and hard drives, helping ease the upcoming

transition from today’s 512-byte native

sector format. The use of 4K native

(4Kn) sectors in hard drives enables larger

capacities than are available with 512-byte

sector drives. The 4Kn sector hard drive

technology is also designed to provide

better data protection and error correction

for large-capacity drives, compared to

512-byte sector drives.

With EqualLogic PS Series array

software v7, administrators can present

volumes in either the 512-byte or the 4K

sector format, regardless of the underlying

drive technology. Organizations that

prefer 512-byte sector volumes can

continue to use them, again regardless

of drive type. Moreover, administrators

can establish an EqualLogic pool that

includes arrays containing 512-byte

native sector drives along with arrays

containing 4Kn sector drives when they

are introduced in 2014.

To further enhance efficiency and ease

of management in the data center, Dell has

released EqualLogic SAN HQ v3.0 along

with EqualLogic PS Series array software v7.

SAN HQ v3.0, a centralized performance

and event monitoring tool, extends the

capabilities of Dell SupportAssist for

an automated and streamlined service

experience. SAN HQ v3.0 and SupportAssist

now feature expanded automated support

case creation as well as reporting and

tracking of open EqualLogic support cases

from within the SAN HQ GUI.

Strong return on storage investment

As enterprises deal with rapidly expanding

data volumes and concentrated workloads,

they require storage systems that make

growing capacity and performance easier

and more predictable than ever. And as

budgets contract or remain flat, IT needs

systems that are easy to deploy and

manage, automatically balancing workloads

across storage resources.

The latest Dell EqualLogic arrays,

incorporating EqualLogic PS Series array

software v7, are designed to meet these

demands without added complexity.

The arrays provide a virtualized scale-

out architecture and easy-to-manage

operations to accelerate efficiency gains

while helping eliminate the requirement

for specialized storage administration skills.

In addition, updated EqualLogic FS Series

NAS appliances support FluidFS v3,

which features powerful policy-based

deduplication and compression that can

be used to minimize the data footprint

and maximize an organization’s return on

investment in EqualLogic storage.

Learn more

Dell EqualLogic:

qrs.ly/ws3o6q6

Authors

Achmad Chadran is an infrastructure solution

specialist in the Dell Enterprise Solution Group.

Follow Achmad on Twitter @a_SAN_a.

Dylan Locsin is a product manager for Dell

Storage, with more than 13 years of experience in

marketing for enterprise storage, networking and

software. Follow Dylan on Twitter @TechDylan.

Jeff Junker has more than 25 years of experience

in storage, networking and media production. He is

currently focused on virtualized storage solutions at

Dell. Follow Jeff on Twitter @equallogic.

4 Based on May 2013 internal Dell analysis of the Dell Fluid File System v3 with Fluid Data Reduction, using a real-world home share environment comprising Microsoft® Office (21 percent), gzip (19 percent) and flat (19 percent) files, among others.

Dell, EqualLogic, Fluid Data and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Dell PowerVault tape solutions

Sponsored content: Solution showcase

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data for longer periods of time than ever before.

Dell PowerVault tape solutions help address

storage challenges by offering a robust, reliable

and cost-effective way to back up and archive

data. Next-generation PowerVault tape solutions

capitalize on LTO-6 technology to help increase

capacity, improve performance and lower TCO.

To optimize data protection, PowerVault tape

solutions complement Dell disk-based storage.

High data transfer rates make tape well suited for

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For more information, visitqrs.ly/332i3ff

Dell and PowerVault are trademarks of Dell Inc.

36 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

In today’s enterprise computing

landscape, desktop virtualization has

gained major traction. Organizations

large and small are adopting hosted

virtual desktops to enable workforce

mobility. At the same time, desktop

virtualization helps simplify management for

the efficient delivery of applications that are

vital to workplace productivity.

Virtual desktops depend on centralized

IT resources that are shared by many users

simultaneously. This centralization helps

streamline administration while enhancing

data protection and security.

Although desktop virtualization is an

established approach offering significant

benefits, many organizations have yet to

take advantage of this technology. When

organizations shy away from replacing

traditional desktops, they tend to cite three

common reasons.

No time for a complex implementation.

Choosing an alternative approach to

desktop management means rethinking

every aspect of application delivery, from

data center infrastructure to endpoint

device. Many enterprises have static IT

infrastructure that can lengthen lead times

for such an all-encompassing project.

Choosing a modular and agile approach

enables organizations to start small, gain

experience with desktop virtualization

functionality and then grow while

accommodating changes in direction.

Up-front costs place too high a burden

on the IT budget. Desktop virtualization

requires drastically different infrastructure than

a traditional desktop model. For example,

desktop disk-drive capacity is traded for

Optimize the virtual desktop experience through strong back-end design

Desktop virtualization streamlines support for a dynamic

workforce while providing employees with easy, secure

access to enterprise resources. Seven best practices

help guide a successful design of the critical back-end

IT infrastructure.

By Bob Ganley

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 37

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

shared data center storage capacity. This

trade-off may lead to an up-front cost per

virtual desktop that is actually higher than

the cost of refreshing desktop hardware.

Consequently, organizations should look for

an efficient approach to desktop virtualization

that helps reduce up-front and ongoing

costs. This desktop virtualization approach

should result in a total cost of ownership

lower than that of buying and maintaining

new desktop hardware.

Desktop virtualization slows computer

performance. User perceptions of

performance can make or break the

success of a desktop virtualization project.

The right components must be configured

in a way that provides an exceptional user

experience. Furthermore, desktop services

cannot be interrupted by downtime, and

centralized data must be kept safe from

compromise and loss. Organizations can

mitigate these risks by heightening quality

of service to help maintain performance,

protect centralized information assets and

simplify support.

7 best practices for successful

desktop virtualization

Desktop virtualization offers convincing

benefits such as resource consolidation

and streamlined management, but those

come at the cost of concentrating compute

power and desktop services in a central

location. Centralization raises the stakes

for IT leaders by making the design and

implementation of desktop virtualization

infrastructure a linchpin of employee

productivity and satisfaction.

To access the virtual desktop, end users

have several choices in endpoint devices,

such as Dell Wyse thin, zero and cloud

clients. Although these devices provide

a tangible interface for end users, what

happens behind the scenes in the data

center ultimately determines budgets,

project schedules, staffing plans, risk

mitigation and end-user satisfaction.

Dell has extensive experience in

designing, building, delivering and

supporting desktop virtualization solutions,

including the critical back-end IT

infrastructure. Based on this experience,

Dell has gleaned seven best practices for

designing a robust framework to support

desktop virtualization.

1. Focus on user experience

To get the right mix of infrastructure

components on the back end, it is

important to start by carefully profiling

and understanding users’ workloads.

This process provides input to the

definition of virtual desktop images that

are optimized to minimize the impact

of desktop consolidation. Among the

ramifications to consider are server,

storage and network utilization.

Server processor. The ability for a

desktop virtualization project to deliver on

the promise of cost-effective performance

depends on maximizing the consolidation

of many small-scale virtual machines

on each physical server. Under normal

operations, processor cycles are the

limiting factor in maximizing consolidation.

Rules of thumb and guessing won’t work

to determine the appropriate server; it is

best to employ a tool that helps assess

the virtual desktop performance, capacity

and scalability of servers for characteristic

workloads. For example, a study by

Principled Technologies showed that the

tested Dell servers comfortably supported

up to 160 virtualized desktops.1

Server graphics. In the past,

organizations typically found it cost-

prohibitive to use virtual desktops to deliver

applications with rich media and graphics.

Today, a graphics processing unit (GPU)

can accelerate high-end graphics support

for end users who require a rich media

experience. For example, Dell engineers

benchmarked the Dell PowerEdge R720

server running Windows 8 in a virtualized

environment supporting a Microsoft®

DirectX®–based game designer application.

In this test study, users with a heavy

graphics requirement accessed the

server through Remote Desktop Services.

The benchmark tests showed that a

single PowerEdge R720 server supported

up to 75 graphics-intensive users.2

These results indicate that this type of

solution enables IT organizations to easily

deliver a high-fidelity, rich multimedia

experience to virtual desktop users across

local area networks (LANs) and wide area

networks (WANs).

1 “Dell PowerEdge M620 Blade Server Solutions for Virtual Desktop Infrastructures,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell Inc., October 2012, bit.ly/18PPEKo.

2 For more information, see “Dell Expands VDI Offerings on Windows Server 2012 With Shared GPU and Converged Infrastructure,” by Nicolas Cuendet, Dell Enterprise IT Perspectives blog, July 16, 2013, dell.to/16UkQo5.

Boosting virtual desktop performance

For its desktop virtualization initiative, law firm Quarles & Brady adopted Dell EqualLogic hybrid storage arrays. As a result, the firm greatly improved disk provisioning, boot times and overall end-user environment responsiveness.

dell.to/150FApK

38 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Storage. The storage requirements of

a given desktop virtualization solution vary

drastically depending on user profiles and

time of day. Short-term spikes in storage

access — including those seen during virtual

machine boots, virus scans, and morning

logins and afternoon logoffs by many users

at approximately the same time — may

cause I/O storms that intensify performance

demands on the storage infrastructure.

Common solutions such as using multiple

disk spindles and short-stroking drives —

formatting a drive so data is stored only

at the outer sectors of the disk platter —

are expensive to buy and own, creating

potential roadblocks to a virtual desktop

infrastructure (VDI).

To incorporate high-performance

storage without breaking the budget, IT

organizations should consider automated

data tiering (see figure). This approach

pairs a small amount of high-performance

storage with cost-effective, capacity-

optimized storage. On each block, the

storage system keeps metadata describing

time of access, access frequency and

so forth. The storage system uses the

metadata to determine the appropriate tier

for the block; it is designed to move inactive

blocks to capacity-optimized storage and

active blocks to high-performance storage.

The Dell strategy emphasizes this type of

intelligent storage.3

Network. Networking connects

servers to each other, to storage and to

other devices. If blade infrastructure is

part of the architecture, a key aspect of

networking communications is how many

steps are consumed by server-to-server

communication, or east-west traffic. One

goal of consolidating desktops into a

hyperdense configuration such as a blade

chassis is to get the desktop image as

close as possible to the server applications.

Dell blade chassis networking facilitates

two-step east-west traffic: one step to

the blade switch and one to the target.

Other blade architectures may require

a fabric interconnect for blade-to-blade

communications, effectively doubling the

number of steps for east-west traffic.

Miercom recently put Dell networking

gear to the test under a VDI workload.4 The

independent testing company found that

Dell networking gear delivered excellent

performance and services that support

a quality end-user experience in a VDI

environment. The Dell Networking S6000

top-of-rack/end-of-row switch exhibited

a high degree of scalability, and it was not

found to be a limiting factor to scalability in

a VDI environment.5

2. Manage lifecycle costs

The expense of owning a PC can easily

grow to five times the initial cost of the

machine.6 Although desktop virtualization

may call for higher up-front costs than

traditional desktops, it also helps reduce

desktop support costs. Typically, storage

is a top driver of up-front costs for the

back-end IT infrastructure required to

support desktop virtualization, followed by

compute resources. Over time, decreased

management complexity becomes a

primary contributor to the reduction of

ongoing expenses for successful desktop

virtualization deployments.

Storage. Storage costs are driven not

only by capacity, but also by performance

requirements. Some solutions to the

storage performance challenge can drive up

the cost of capacity with techniques such

as short stroking or using a large number

of low-capacity disks. Another technique

involves allocating a large amount of

solid-state drives that must have specific

volumes, such as gold masters, assigned to

them by a storage administrator.

Dell storage offers a fundamentally

different approach that features automated

data tiering to help lower the total cost

of ownership for desktop virtualization

storage. Dell commissioned Principled

3 For more information about storage tiering for desktop virtualization, see “Maximizing Desktop Virtualization Success With VDI-optimized Dell EqualLogic Hybrid Arrays,” by Taneja Group, March 2011, dell.to/16FvQSx.

4 “Dell Networking S6000: High-performance 10/40 GbE Top-of-rack Switch,” by Miercom, August 2013, dell.to/1e9SXhM.

5 For more information about the Dell Networking S6000 switch, see “Bridging Physical and Virtual Networks With Ease and Efficiency,” by Kamesh Kothuri and James Wynia, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/ud3n8xl.

6 “Breaking Down the Barriers to VDI With Dell EqualLogic iSCSI SAN Arrays,” by Taneja Group, December 2010, dell.to/1avnNLM.

Automated tiering is designed to dynamically and nondisruptively optimize storage to provide the right performance without breaking the bank.

Desktopvirtual machines

User N

App

OS

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12:05:09•••

Block pool Tier 1

Tier 2

Tier 3

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Logical storage Physical storage

Metadata

Automated data tiering

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 39

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Technologies to perform two comparative

studies that quantified the reduction in energy

consumption and cost per virtual desktop

enabled by automated tiering. In those studies,

the evaluated Dell storage configuration was

shown to deliver 51 percent lower cost per

desktop and up to 68 percent less power

consumption than storage alternatives.7

Virtual desktop density. A good metric for

comparing the up-front cost of server resources

required in a given desktop virtualization solution

is virtual desktop density: cost per virtual desktop,

number of virtual desktops per physical server

and number of physical servers per rack. The Dell

PowerEdge M620 server has demonstrated up

to 19.4 percent lower purchase cost per virtual

desktop and up to 63.1 percent lower power

consumption compared to other tested servers.8

Ongoing management. In a Taneja Group

survey, 89 percent of data center managers

reported that their administrators waste time

because of the complexity of virtualization

management.9 Reducing this complexity

can lead to a direct decrease in the cost of

ownership for desktop virtualization.

Dell Active System Manager is a tool that

consolidates common management tasks for

servers, network, storage and virtualization in a

single interface. It provides a centralized means

to capture and apply desktop virtualization–

specific configurations and best practices through

template-based provisioning and workflow

coordination. In addition, the tool facilitates

management of cluster-level and virtual machine

lifecycles through deep integration with the

Microsoft® Hyper-V® and VMware vSphere®

virtualization platforms.

An analysis by Principled Technologies found

that the Dell Management Plug-in for VMware®

vCenter™ tool required 76 percent less hands-on

time for deploying VMware vSphere, compared to

a different management tool.10

3. Start small and grow

The productivity of many employees depends

on their desktop computing environment. If a

problem occurs during desktop virtualization

deployment, it could disrupt workforce

productivity. Therefore, it is unusual to implement

a wide rollout at the early stages of a desktop

virtualization project. Starting with a small

community of early adopters is the best way

to gain experience with the solution and build

confidence for a larger deployment.

Pilot-to-production plan. Pilot

implementations lack many characteristics

of a production deployment. To address this

challenge, Dell recommends that the solution

be designed for scalability from the start. As

the number of virtual desktops increases, the

architecture should not fundamentally change to

support growing populations. The goal is to avoid

forklift upgrades, which can disrupt operations

and waste infrastructure investments.

Modular infrastructure building blocks. To

support scalability, Dell recommends designing

around deployment modules; each module

can support a variable number of users. As

users are added, organizations can populate an

individual module to handle the rising capacity

and performance requirements in a process

called scale up. Once the scale-up design point is

reached for an individual module, organizations

can scale out — adding more modules as needed

to accommodate growing populations. The Dell

Active System 800 converged infrastructure

solution provides an example of this modular

approach in a study by Principled Technologies,

where the system was shown to scale from 900

to 1,800 VDI users.11

7 “VDI With Dell EqualLogic Hybrid Arrays: A Comparative Study With the Industry-Leading SAN Solution,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell Inc., January 2013, dell.to/14zBJiS, and “VDI With Dell EqualLogic Hybrid Arrays: A Comparative Study With the Industry-Leading NAS Solution,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell Inc., March 2013, dell.to/1312rBH.

8 “Dell PowerEdge M620 Blade Server Solutions for Virtual Desktop Infrastructures,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell Inc., October 2012, bit.ly/18PPEKo.

9 “Breaking Down the Barriers to VDI With Dell EqualLogic iSCSI SAN Arrays,” by Taneja Group, December 2010, dell.to/1avnNLM.

10 “Centralized Systems Management: Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter vs. HP Insight Control for vCenter Server,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell Inc., October 2012, bit.ly/16NfD3v.

11 “Dell Active System 800 Converged Infrastructure Solution: VDI and Collaboration Performance,” by Principled Technologies, commissioned by Dell Inc., January 2013, bit.ly/XTbeVc.

Enriching education through VDI

Performance of legacy systems at Socorro Independent School District limited their usefulness for teachers and students. Discover how Dell helped the district use VDI technologies to deliver modern computing capabilities on legacy hardware.

dell.to/1f7vWXQ

40 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

4. Protect corporate data

Centralized desktop services consolidate

information assets. This consolidation offers

tremendous benefits for streamlining control

and security efforts. But it also presents

risks in maintaining service availability and

protecting information.

Layered data protection. Data protection

involves more than just backups. Recovery times

and recovery points must be aligned with the value

of the data being protected. For example, Dell

recommends using snapshots of primary storage

systems as a means to establish frequent recovery

points that can be quickly brought online. Daily

backups take longer to restore than snapshots

because snapshot restoration is designed to be a

nearly instantaneous volume rollback on primary

storage. Alternatively, backups are made to nearline

capacity-optimized disk media that is more cost-

effective than primary storage. In addition, archives

help reduce the amount of cold data saved on

nearline storage while providing compliance with

corporate and legal mandates.

Integrated data protection. Hypervisor-aware

data protection tools map operating system and

hypervisor objects to the underlying storage in

a way that enables hypervisor and application-

consistent snapshots and backups. This integration

of data protection tools with the hypervisor allows

administrators to restore executable machine

images and configurations from recovery points.

The data storage and the hypervisor should be

integrated at both the management level and the

application programming interface (API) level.

5. Ensure service availability

The layered approach to data protection extends

to all aspects of the desktop service infrastructure.

Recovery points for application data and virtual

images should be augmented with protection

from hardware failures and site failures.

Automation. Human error is often considered

to be the primary cause of security failures such

as breakdowns, business interruptions and system

outages. Dell Active System Manager is designed

to automate management workflows and reduce

the number of human interactions that can lead

to downtime. Dell internal testing performed

in October 2012 has shown that Active System

Manager enables administrators to take systems

from bare metal to ready-to-host virtual machines

in up to 75 percent fewer steps compared to

blade server solutions from other vendors.12

High-availability architecture. The physical

infrastructure should be protected with high

availability designed into every level. The server,

storage and networking components of the

desktop virtualization back-end solution require

redundancy, such as hot-swappable components

and standby spares, as well as proactive problem

detection, warning and resolution.

Site resilience. High-availability hardware

setups cannot protect against downtime if the

building loses power or is affected by some other

site-specific issue. To optimize service availability,

organizations should establish a disaster recovery

site and keep that site current so that services can

be restored with little or no downtime. For this

scenario, Dell recommends storage-level replication

that is integrated with virtualization management.

Organizations should look for automated replication —

whether synchronous or asynchronous — that can

propagate hypervisor- and application-consistent

data sets to the remote site.

6. Speed time to value

To capitalize on the promise of desktop

virtualization, organizations should consider ways

of accelerating the time to value of their desktop

virtualization projects.

Field-tested components. If an IT

organization chooses to design and build the VDI,

it should choose components that have been

tested and shown to be exceptionally well suited

for desktop virtualization.

Reference architectures. If the IT organization

prefers some guidance while performing the

integration, it should leverage reference architectures

that are specific to its choice of hypervisor and

virtual desktop management software. Dell has

invested over 100,000 hours of engineering effort

to develop a set of 12 reference architectures that

12 For more information on automating VDI deployment using Dell Active System Manager, visit dell.to/16iawqO.

Getting a fast start

Hudson County needed a virtualization solution that improved operating efficiency. By deploying a pre-cabled, ready-to-run converged infrastructure system from Dell, the county experienced a fivefold faster time to value.

dell.to/12wgWjR

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 41

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

cover typical combinations of hypervisors

and desktop virtualization software.13

Pre-integrated offerings. Perhaps the

fastest way to reach production readiness

is to deploy a pre-configured converged

infrastructure platform that contains all the

components required for the back end. Dell

offers several ready-to-deploy configurations

for desktop virtualization that can support

from tens to thousands of users. Dell Active

Systems and Dell PowerEdge VRTX are

among the converged platforms that are

optimized for desktop virtualization.

7. Simplify support

Given the broad range of components

that comprise a desktop virtualization

implementation, one of the best ways

to simplify support is to partner with an

organization that can provide end-to-end

coverage from the client to the data center,

as well as start-to-finish support from

inception through design, deployment and

ongoing system management.

Dell provides comprehensive support

for all aspects of desktop virtualization.

Dell Services has implemented more than

1,000 desktop virtualization projects for

organizations worldwide.

Delivery models. Organizations can

implement desktop virtualization in a

range of ways, from self-deployed, self-

managed on-site installations to completely

outsourced implementations such as the

desktop-as-a-service (DaaS) model. In

the Dell DaaS On Demand offering, Dell

manages and supports an organization’s

virtual desktops in the Dell Cloud. The

other end of the spectrum is in-house

deployment, which may be based on a

pre-configured or customized solution.

Organizations can engage Dell Services to

help design, deploy and/or manage on-site

desktop virtualization (see figure).

Desktop virtualization for

a responsive user experience

Getting the data center infrastructure

right is critical for a successful desktop

virtualization deployment. Dell

Desktop Virtualization Solutions (DVS)

are specifically designed to simplify

and accelerate the transition to desktop

virtualization. As an end-to-end provider

of desktop virtualization solutions —

from the client to the cloud — Dell has

leveraged its extensive experience to

develop seven best practices for desktop

virtualization. These best practices help

organizations accelerate support for

mobile workplace initiatives through

a back-end IT infrastructure that

enables an optimal user experience

without compromising security.

Moreover, by engaging an experienced

solutions organization as early as

possible during the process, enterprises

worldwide can pave the way to a

smooth and successful desktop

virtualization deployment.

Learn more

Dell desktop virtualization solutions:

dell.to/16ob5dG

Dell Active System Manager:

dell.to/174EDBB

Dell data protection:

dell.to/16jmHP3

Author

Bob Ganley is a senior marketing manager

at Dell and is responsible for converged

infrastructure solutions marketing.

DVS EnterpriseActive Infrastructure

DVS Simplified Appliance DVS DaaS

Pre-configured solution Desktop as a service

Organization manages or Dell manages Dell manages

On-site In the cloud

Dell Desktop Virtualization Solutions (DVS) offer a range of flexible deployment options.

13 To learn more about Dell reference architectures, visit dell.to/15hteha.

Dell, EqualLogic, PowerEdge and Wyse are trademarks of Dell Inc.

42 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Over the years, enterprises have

entrusted their mission-critical

applications and demanding

workloads to proprietary UNIX®

and mainframe systems. While these proprietary

systems may have been the right choice based

on available options at the time, there are now

simpler and more efficient alternatives for

architecting applications on modern, standards-

based infrastructure.

Understandably, some organizations are

reluctant to migrate from a familiar infrastructure.

Business leaders are often concerned about

maintaining the performance and availability of

their critical applications, and IT decision makers

may feel they lack the time, budget and expertise

to carry out a modernization project.

However, retaining an outdated infrastructure

carries its own risks. In addition to subjecting

organizations to potential vendor lock-in, legacy

systems can create undue cost burdens related to

upgrades, operations, maintenance and services.

A siloed application architecture and monolithic

infrastructure can also introduce inefficiencies

related to utilization and agility, including the

inability to easily adapt or scale to meet changing

business needs.

Perhaps the biggest risk of an outdated

infrastructure is that it limits the ability of an

organization to take advantage of the latest

data center optimization techniques, such as

virtualization; cloud-based service delivery; and

advanced data protection, disaster recovery and

business continuity strategies. At the same time,

standards-based technologies have evolved

substantially in recent years and are designed to

support the demands of performance-intensive,

mission-critical workloads.

Turning to open standards

To create highly efficient, agile and resilient IT

infrastructures for mission-critical applications,

savvy IT organizations are migrating legacy

applications to standards-based x86 architectures.

Solutions based on open standards are designed

to work smoothly across multiple technologies,

so organizations can evaluate alternatives based

on competitive factors such as performance,

flexibility and agility instead of compatibility and

vendor support. Designed to be interoperable,

standards-based technologies enable a modular

architecture created from cost-effective building

blocks that can scale in and scale out.

Standards-based technologies across

different infrastructure layers can be integrated

into centralized management tools, streamlining

business processes and optimizing IT resources.

As an added advantage, support and upgrades of

standards-based solutions often do not require

the scarce and specialized skill sets needed to

operate proprietary technologies.

By delivering streamlined management

as well as highly efficient power and cooling

capabilities, standards-based technologies help

Taking a holistic approach to data center modernization

Data center modernization is the linchpin for creating an agile,

cost-effective and resilient IT infrastructure. Standards-based

Dell server, storage and networking technologies, combined

with Dell Application Modernization services, smooth the way.

By Vikram Belapurkar and Wendy Williams

Case in point

Through data center modernization, enterprises can boost operational efficiency while aligning IT with strategic goals. Find out how CoreLogic is working with Dell to re-host its existing IT infrastructure and leverage next-generation cloud computing to accommodate long-term growth.

dell.to/18b6wFM

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 43

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

drive down operational costs. Additionally,

x86-based systems support a wide array of

operating systems and hypervisors, enabling

IT decision makers to choose the best

platform for their workloads.

Incorporating key

data center technologies

Data center modernization projects present

prime opportunities not only to update the

hardware infrastructure but also to overhaul

the dynamics of the data center. To develop

a comprehensive modernization strategy,

IT leaders should consider many of the

technologies and paradigms that have evolved

since the deployment of their legacy platforms.

Server virtualization. By allowing

multiple operating systems and applications

to share compute resources, server

virtualization helps improve resource

utilization — contributing to significant

reductions in both operational and capital

expenses. Additionally, because virtualization

decouples the OS and applications from

physical hardware, it enables quick, efficient

workload migration across multiple server

nodes, boosting IT infrastructure agility.

Storage modernization. Traditional

storage technologies used in legacy

application architectures are often costly,

rigid and complex to manage and scale.

Additionally, siloed legacy architectures may

introduce massive underutilization of storage

resources. Modern storage technologies

incorporate paradigms such as storage

virtualization, data tiering, flash-based I/O

optimization and integrated infrastructure

management. These capabilities help lower

the total cost of storage, ensure outstanding

performance and simplify management.

Network optimization. Innovations

over the years have led to an increase in

the reliability and performance of IP-based

networking technologies. Now supporting

up to 40 Gbps transfer rates, these

technologies are well suited to replace

proprietary networking components found

in legacy application architectures. Modern

network architectures that leverage software

intelligence enable simple management,

quick delivery of network services and

consistent, predictable network performance.

Data protection and disaster recovery

enhancements. Traditionally, the data

protection and disaster recovery process has

been costly, cumbersome and unreliable.

Modern data protection and disaster recovery

technologies integrate with servers, storage

and applications to help deliver reliable results,

ease of operation and decreased storage

requirements — leading to high levels of

data availability and business continuity.

Cloud computing. By facilitating

a dynamic IT infrastructure, cloud

computing empowers line-of-business

users to service their own IT needs and

track their resource usage. Organizations

looking to modernize their application

infrastructure may find an on-site private

cloud–based application delivery model

well suited to their requirements. Other

organizations may conclude that off-site

public cloud environments can augment

their IT infrastructure efficiently and flexibly,

providing services such as data protection,

disaster recovery and on-demand storage.

Optimizing infrastructure

for a modern data center

By offering a standards-based portfolio of

server, storage and networking solutions

optimized for demanding workloads, Dell

enables organizations to modernize their aging

IT infrastructure in a way that drives down

total cost of ownership, simplifies management

and scales with organizational growth.

Dell PowerEdge servers

Dell PowerEdge 12th-generation servers are

designed to lower operational costs while

providing business-critical reliability and

resiliency. These standards-based servers

embody Dell’s commitment to x86-based

server architecture.

Tightly integrated management tools,

including the Dell OpenManage suite,

facilitate simple, effective management

of server infrastructure in a variety of

operating environments, both physical and

virtual. Additionally, to enhance operating

efficiency, PowerEdge servers incorporate

leading-edge power optimization features

such as fresh-air cooling and innovative

power-efficient blade enclosure designs.

To accelerate I/O performance,

PowerEdge servers can support Dell Fluid

Cache, which caches read operations on

local flash storage. PowerEdge servers also

feature flash storage on the motherboard

that can host a redundant hypervisor. In

case of drive failure, PowerEdge servers

are designed to quickly and seamlessly fail

over to the redundant hypervisor, helping

maintain continuous business operations

and high availability.

PowerEdge servers are available in myriad

form factors — including blade, rack mount,

tower and cloud-optimized variations — to

support a range of application architectures,

from demanding database implementations to

distributed, high-density virtual deployments

to high-performance computing (HPC).

Dell storage

Dell storage solutions are designed to lower

the total cost of storage while delivering

outstanding performance. A virtualized storage

architecture helps simplify how storage

resources are provisioned, managed and

presented to applications, streamlining

operations and optimizing utilization.

Dell storage management tools are

integrated with virtualization management

software. As a result, administrators can

manage their virtual infrastructure and

storage through a single user interface,

leading to reduced management overhead.

The automated tiering capability of

Dell storage optimizes data placement on

underlying storage resources based

on actual use and predefined policies.

Automated tiering enables blazing fast

performance while minimizing manual

tuning. Moreover, Dell Flash-Optimized

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.44 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Storage solutions are designed to optimize

performance for demanding transactional

workloads such as database applications.1

Dell storage solutions offer integrated

data protection and disaster recovery

tools that leverage native thin replication

technology. These tools are designed

to efficiently protect mission-critical

environments from data loss and disasters.

Dell networking

Innovative Dell Networking data center

switching products enable high-performance,

scalable and open solutions that meet the

requirements of demanding enterprise

environments. These switches are

engineered from the ground up to deliver

uncompromising performance. When

combined with Dell network automation and

orchestration software, they provide feature-

rich flexibility for any size deployment.

Dell Active Fabric is a family of high-

performance, cost-effective networking

solutions to interconnect server, storage and

software elements in cloud and virtualized

data centers. Active Fabric solutions

comprise low-power, high-throughput

10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) and 40 Gigabit

Ethernet (40GbE) switching platforms

equipped with fully featured layer 2/3

multipath fabric technology. Additional

functionality includes software-defined

networking (SDN) programmability and

industry-standard data center bridging (DCB)

options for storage area network (SAN)/local

area network (LAN) convergence.

All Dell switching systems are powered

by the industry-hardened, feature-rich Dell

Networking Operating System (formerly FTOS)

for maximum dependability and uptime.

Additionally, for ease of use at scale, Dell

Networking Open Automation Framework

and orchestration software helps simplify

management for virtualized environments

and streamlines operations to cost-effectively

scale to large-capacity data centers.

Streamlining the transition

To help organizations make a smooth

transition from legacy environments to

modern, standards-based technologies,

Dell provides end-to-end application

modernization services that consider

an organization’s current and planned

infrastructure, application workloads and

operational requirements. This holistic

approach helps organizations develop a

comprehensive modernization strategy that

aligns with their overall IT strategy — which is

the key to a sustainable, efficient application

delivery model. (For more information, see

the sidebar, “Evaluating the payoff.”).

Dell Services consultants combine

leading-edge software tools and

migration services to develop and execute

modernization plans that fit an organization’s

business and technical requirements:

• Re-host: Migrate legacy applications to a

cost-effective, standards-based platform

with minimal change

• Re-architect: Modernize application

environments by rebuilding legacy

applications in modern frameworks

• Replace: Exchange custom legacy

applications with enterprise-ready,

off-the-shelf software

• Retire: Decommission legacy

applications that are no longer useful

Assessment of current application landscape

Before undertaking a complete migration,

organizations that have not yet mapped out a

modernization strategy or that need a detailed

understanding of the applications, databases

and processes running in their data centers

should start with a portfolio assessment. IT

leaders can work with Dell consultants to gain

a comprehensive view of their application

environment’s current state, from both a

technical and a business perspective.

Dell experts analyze source code assets,

use cases and functional interdependencies.

They also extract data domain models to

create mapping rules that help accurately

convert all required legacy data into a

modernized data structure.

This thorough inventory of business and

technical assets is collected in a software-

as-a-service (SaaS)–based central repository

to provide a clear view of how legacy

applications currently meet organizational

objectives and to keep stakeholders

informed throughout the project.

Understanding which business processes

are still relevant helps prevent spending

valuable time and resources converting

elements that are no longer required.

Through Dell Portfolio Assessment,

consultants help IT leaders structure

disposition strategies for their organizations’

applications into a transformation program

that balances business priorities with

modern technical enablers — mapping out

a path toward a modernized data center.

Application re-hosting

For organizations with legacy application

environments that currently meet

functionality needs but drain annual operating

budgets, Dell Application Re-hosting

solutions can provide a suitable path forward.

Application re-hosting involves migrating

legacy applications to cost-effective, open

platforms without changing business features

and functionality. By preserving existing

investments in application logic and data,

application re-hosting is designed to provide

a safe, cost-effective approach with minimal

disruption to daily operations.

Dell can re-host custom applications

from mainframes. In addition, Dell can

re-host or re-platform a variety of workloads

running on outdated UNIX systems, including

custom, packaged and infrastructure

applications as well as databases.

Since only minimal changes are

required, re-hosting can be performed

relatively quickly. Re-hosting helps simplify

1 For more information about Dell flash disk storage, see “Expediting workload performance with flash storage,” by Jeremy Garner and John Mannix, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/5x3o6qz.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 45

the application environment, leading to

significant reductions in operating costs.

Application re-architecting

For organizations running custom

applications on legacy systems that are

constraining business agility, Dell Application

Re-architecting solutions rebuild legacy

applications in an updated Oracle® Java®

or Microsoft® .NET framework. The

re-architecting process helps reduce the

amount of redundant and outdated custom

code in a legacy application portfolio,

making it easy to introduce new functionality

into the planned framework. Dell experts

also migrate data during a re-architecture

project and help assure that all business-

critical features remain intact and complete.

Organizations can choose to enhance

application functionality during the

re-architecture process — for example, to

support strategic directives such as cloud

and mobile computing — without changing

workflows. For applications with incomplete

documentation, Dell consultants can reverse

engineer applications to extract program

logic before rebuilding the application.

Ongoing service and support

During a modernization project, Dell

consultants learn the landscape and

characteristics of an organization’s

application environment. After a

modernization project, many organizations

therefore engage Dell Services to

provide help-desk support or application

maintenance through bug fixes, patches,

enhancements, upgrades and basic user

provisioning. These support services free up an

organization’s IT staff to focus on value-added

tasks, such as application development.

Building an infrastructure to capitalize

on emerging technologies

Many organizations have vital assets locked

inside legacy applications that have served

them well for years. But legacy environments

often cannot cost-effectively handle

today’s real-time demands. Data center

modernization provides IT with a pathway

to unlocking these legacy assets while

taking advantage of emerging technologies

and cost-effective, flexible open platforms.

For organizations looking to modernize

their legacy application environments, Dell

can act as a single source for hardware,

software, service and ongoing support.

This end-to-end approach streamlines the

modernization process and minimizes

possible conflicts from managing multiple

vendors during a migration. Dell leverages

its broad-based experience in various

vertical domains, including healthcare,

government and financial services, to help

organizations optimize their efficiency,

agility and competitiveness.

Evaluating the payoffData center modernization is a crucial

initiative for enterprise IT departments

today. A successful modernization

initiative helps deliver significant benefits

to an organization.

High efficiency. Data center

modernization helps reduce annual

hardware maintenance costs and

software fees associated with legacy

systems. Dell Application Re-hosting

has cut the annual operating costs

associated with legacy systems for many

organizations by 30 to 70 percent. In

addition, standards-based systems help

drive down operating costs through

efficient power and cooling technology.

One challenge of legacy applications

is that they tend to be managed as a

separate silo from other applications. A

simpler, more cost-effective approach

is to integrate the applications on a

distributed platform built on industry-

standard technology. Streamlining

application management helps lower

operating costs, including those

associated with retaining specialized

personnel to maintain legacy systems.

Heightened agility. IT can respond

rapidly to user change requests and

deploy applications and updates

efficiently with modern applications.

This quick response is further enabled

by the easy scaling made possible by a

modular scale-out approach.

Investment protection. A well-planned

modernization program helps protect

existing investments in the enterprise logic,

enterprise processes and intellectual property

that have made the legacy applications an

integral part of the organization.

Business transformation. Today’s

applications and infrastructure should

enable — not inhibit — business

transformation. Modernization is critical

to support the deployment of important

trends driving IT, such as cloud computing,

virtualization, mobility, social media, big

data and compliance.

Learn more

Dell application modernization services:

Dell.com/appmod

Authors

Vikram Belapurkar is a solutions marketing

manager at Dell, focused on data center

modernization and virtualization solutions.

He has over a decade of technical and

marketing experience spanning enterprise

systems and software. Follow Vikram on

Twitter @VirtualStorageV.

Wendy Williams is a marketing manager

for Dell Services. She is focused on

application services and has over 15 years

of experience marketing IT solutions,

including application modernization.

Dell, Compellent, EqualLogic, OpenManage and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

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fast boot-up times, smooth multitasking and quick program launches.

Exceptional multitasking performance for Ultrabook systems

Dell, Dell Precision, Latitude, PowerEdge and XPS are trademarks of Dell Inc.

For more information, visit Dell.com/business/ssd

Sponsored content: Solution showcase

Dell PowerEdge R720 serverThe highly scalable memory, I/O capacity and flexible

network options of the Dell PowerEdge R720 rack server

enable you to readily handle today’s demanding, complex

workloads. The server includes Intel® Xeon® E5-2600

processors and the ability to support dual RAID controllers

for exceptional processing of compute-intensive tasks.

Flexible, powerful I/O and storage capabilities help you

keep pace with rapidly expanding data volumes. Up to four

hot-plug, front-access Samsung SM843T SSDs in capacities

ranging to 960 GB enable performance-enhancing, in-box

storage tiering, with power-loss protection. And by adding

an optional graphics processing unit (GPU), you can boost

the performance of your virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI)

or high-performance computing (HPC) environment.

For large, data-intensive server workloads, Samsung SSDs are designed to provide exceptional

sustained random and sequential speeds. Enhanced write endurance means long-lasting performance

for your servers. By incorporating high-performance Samsung SSD technology into its servers and

workstations, Dell enables you to raise the productivity bar while optimizing storage capacity.

Dell Precision M6800 workstationMobile productivity and

smart design are combined

in the high-performance,

dependable Dell Precision

M6800 workstation. Intel Core

processor options, along with fast Samsung SSDs, make

the workstation an excellent system for designing digital

content, working with computer-aided design (CAD) models

or executing other performance-intensive applications. The

Dell Precision M6800 supports Samsung SSDs from 128 GB

to 512 GB, with optional RAID-0, RAID-1 or RAID-5. Brilliant

screens in HD+ or FHD resolution are designed to provide

accurate color reproduction and vivid images.

Outstanding sustained performance for workstations and servers

48 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Many enterprises have adopted

cloud computing and mobile

solutions to enhance business

agility and worker productivity.

However, these technologies can expose

organizations of all sizes to cyberthreats, adding

risk, complexity and cost to securing data and IT

assets. What started as casual hackers releasing

simple viruses has evolved into a complex,

rapidly growing threat landscape comprising

advanced persistent threats (APTs), cybercriminal

activity, spam and industrial espionage.

Although network security technology

has improved in recent years, attackers

are succeeding through a combination of

technically sophisticated attacks and relatively

simple techniques. According to data breaches

analyzed by the Verizon RISK team, the vast

majority — 75 percent — of all security incidents

were crimes of opportunity rather than targeted

A network security strategy should address today’s security and

compliance issues as well as tomorrow’s threats. Dell Connected

Security solutions offer a proactive approach that mitigates present

and anticipated risks while maintaining performance.

By Daniel Ayoub

Achieving deep network security through a connected, holistic strategy

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 49

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

attacks. And 69 percent of breaches were

discovered by an external party.1 In fact, the

median amount of time attackers have network

access before being identified is more than

eight months, according to Mandiant.2 The need

for a strong, persistent line of cyberdefense is

clear, with early detection and notification key

components in an organization’s security arsenal.

Minimizing cyberthreats

Modern threats employ diverse techniques to sneak

into corporate networks to steal intellectual property

or cause destruction. Attackers may rely on Secure

Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption to hide malware

being downloaded or to disguise command-

and-control traffic sent from halfway around the

world. Moreover, these threats are often encoded

using multifarious complicated algorithms to

evade detection by an intrusion prevention

system (IPS). After the target has been exploited,

the threat attempts to download and install

malware onto the compromised system. In many

instances, the malware is an evolved variant that

traditional anti-virus solutions do not yet address.

To effectively combat these threats,

organizations require network security that

provides the ability to decrypt and inspect

every SSL-encrypted connection crossing the

network on any port; an IPS with advanced

anti-evasion capabilities; and network-based

malware protection. Yet many solutions available

today are unable to deliver these capabilities at

an acceptable level of performance. Moreover,

organizations may lack the on-site expertise

needed to expertly manage a multifunctioned

security solution.

Many organizations have created disparate

layers of security to battle cyberthreats, effectively

managing their IT security in silos. Unfortunately,

this siloed approach can create additional risk.

Instead, IT decision makers should consider

adopting a connected security ecosystem, in

which components work together so that less

management expertise is required to achieve

rock-solid network protection.

Meeting the security challenge

Dell Connected Security solutions enable

enterprises to approach security in a holistic

and connected way by providing products that

span from endpoint to data center to cloud.

Connected Security solutions help enterprises

mitigate risks and achieve stringent information

security and compliance objectives. Plus,

they enhance IT efficiencies, productivity and

scalability to actively drive business growth.

Dell Network Security firewalls enable world-

class threat protection without compromising

performance. The Dell next-generation firewalls

combine a scalable, multi-core architecture

with a patented Reassembly-Free Deep Packet

Inspection (RFDPI) engine (see figure). This

single-pass threat-prevention engine is designed

to inspect each byte of every packet while

maintaining high performance.

The Dell patented single-pass inspection

engine is crucial to stopping SSL-encrypted threats.

1 “2013 Data Breach Investigations Report,” by Verizon RISK Team, 2013, verizonenterprise.com/DBIR/2013.

2 “M-Trends® 2013: Attack the Security Gap™,” by Mandiant, 2013, mandiant.com/resources/m-trends.

A core feature of Dell Network Security firewalls, the Reassembly-Free Deep Packet Inspection (RFDPI) engine combines several advanced technologies to enable next-generation threat prevention.

Next-generation threat prevention

anti-malware with cloud assist

Network-based

SSL decryptio

n

and inspection

IPS

wit

h s

oph

istic

ated

anti

-eva

sion

Patentedsingle-pass

RFDPIengine

50 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

As much as 35 percent of corporate network

traffic is encrypted using SSL.3 Consequently,

organizations that do not decrypt and inspect

their SSL traffic can be considered effectively

blind to approximately one-third of the data

crossing their networks. In this scenario, attacks

that utilize SSL will likely have a 100 percent

success rate. Real-time SSL decryption and

inspection technology of Dell Network Security

firewalls enables the RFDPI engine to decrypt

and examine all network traffic on every port.

In addition to hiding their attacks using SSL

encryption, cybercriminals often try to circumvent

the IPS by obfuscating advanced attacks through the

use of multiple complex algorithms. To mitigate these

threats, network security products need to perform

data normalization to decode threats before the

IPS has a chance to examine them. If enterprises

rely on products that do not adequately normalize

data, the encoded threats can compromise the

network without being noticed.

The RFDPI engine of Dell Network Security

firewalls includes an IPS with sophisticated anti-

evasion technology. It inspects network traffic for

worms, Trojans, software vulnerabilities, backdoor

exploits and other types of malicious activity.

Moreover, advanced threat protection capabilities

are designed to decode hidden attacks before

they can harm the organization.

The final component required to provide

a deep level of network security is up-to-

the-minute, real-time protection against the

multitudes of malware variants that are spawned

every hour. Dell Network Security firewalls help

enterprises stay ahead of these advanced threats

through network-based malware protection that

leverages the power of more than one million

connected sensors. The Dell GRID network,

which is updated continually, currently contains

more than 14 million variants of malware. The

GRID network is managed by a dedicated,

in-house Dell SonicWALL Threat Research Team,

which collects thousands of malware samples

every day from around the world.

Staying ahead of threats

Today’s IT decision makers face three security

imperatives: protect systems and data, give

authorized users the precise access that they need,

and reduce the burdens and cost of administering

security. With a holistic approach to security, the

Dell Connected Security portfolio helps IT leaders

solve these challenges while gaining improved IT

efficiencies, productivity and scalability.

Part of the Connected Security portfolio,

Dell Network Security firewalls combine high-

performance SSL decryption and inspection with

an IPS that features sophisticated anti-evasion

technology and a network-based malware

protection system that leverages the power

of the cloud. These capabilities enable Dell

Network Security firewalls to provide a high

level of network security without compromising

performance for organizations of any size.

Author

Daniel Ayoub is a product manager with Dell

Network Security.

Learn more

Dell SonicWALL next-generation firewalls:

qrs.ly/zg3o6q5

Network security in action

On game day, the Denver Broncos football franchise requires fast network performance, threat protection and secure WiFi for fans. Watch this short video to see how Dell SonicWALL products help the Denver Broncos deliver the experience that fans expect.

qrs.ly/hr3o6q3

3 “SSL Performance Problems: Significant SSL Performance Loss Leaves Much Room for Improvement,” by John W. Pirc, NSS Labs, June 2013, nsslabs.com/reports/ssl-performance-problems.

Dell, Reassembly-Free Deep Packet Inspection and SonicWALL are trademarks of Dell Inc.

“ With a holistic approach to security, the Dell

Connected Security portfolio helps IT leaders

solve these challenges while gaining improved

IT efficiencies, productivity and scalability.”

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 51

Virtualization and cloud

computing have spurred the

evolution of the modern data

center, as enterprises seek

to capitalize on revolutionary gains in

productivity and cost savings enabled

by these technologies. The move to a

virtualized infrastructure has led many

IT decision makers to rethink their

enterprise networking strategies. For

instance, server and storage resource

pools created through virtualization

support on-demand scalable performance

for specific applications, but many

organizations require the ability to scale

the overall data center to meet dynamic

business needs. This type of scalability

calls for networking resources to be

virtualized so that they can be provisioned

and managed independently of the

underlying hardware.

Network virtualization is particularly

vital in cloud environments in which

multiple tenants share system resources.

Network security and traffic segmentation

is required to provide each tenant with

network isolation. However, to meet tenant

demands, operators must be able to quickly

move workloads to servers with available

resources. To enable workload mobility,

the networking architecture should not tie

workloads to the physical network.

The need for logical networks

In a virtualized data center, organizations

can quickly provision virtual machines

(VMs) to support additional workloads.

However, it can take two to three weeks to

configure a traditional network so that the

new VMs can communicate across

the data center. One reason is that

traditional networks are pre-provisioned

and difficult to change on the fly. The

network infrastructure may have a rigid

hierarchical design that is dictated by

physical switch capacity.

Compute resources are tied to the

layer 2 network boundary, with the

Network virtualization helps data centers boost operational

efficiency and scale quickly to meet dynamic workload

demands. Dell and Intel support automated, flexible

networking with network overlays using the Virtual

Extensible LAN (VXLAN) protocol.

By Brian Johnson and Rich Hernandez

Continuing the transformational journey toward peak network agility

Features

52 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

result that workloads cannot make use

of resources available in different racks

because they are in separate layer 2

domains. Also, administrators cannot

provision a large number of isolated layer 2

networks, because the virtual LAN (VLAN)

specification imposes a limit of 4,094 IDs

in a network. Network virtualization offers

a way to surmount these challenges and

provision required network services as easily

and as quickly as VMs.

Network virtualization using overlays

To create an automated, flexible network,

data centers can adopt a software-

defined networking (SDN) approach,

which decouples the logical network

from the physical network. One method

of implementing SDN is through Network

Virtualization Overlays (NVOs). NVOs

allow compute resources to be pooled

across noncontiguous clusters or pods.

Administrators can then segment this pool

into logical networks attached to specific

workloads and applications.

Unlike VLANs, the logical networks

span virtual resource pools and physical

boundaries — and as such, are designed

to be more efficient, scalable, resilient

and manageable. Since logical networks

are abstracted, they can be scaled

without reconfiguring the underlying

physical hardware. This capability

helps avoid the time-consuming

cycles needed for provisioning and

managing VLANs.

NVOs are logical layer 2 networks

that float on top of existing physical

layer 2 and layer 3 technologies (see figure).

This abstraction allows VMs on different

networks to communicate as if they were in

the same layer 2 subnet. NVOs are enabled

by the Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN)

protocol, which specifies a format for how

layer 2 logical networks are encapsulated in

standard layer 3 IP packets.

A 24-bit segment ID in every VXLAN

frame differentiates the logical networks

from each other without the need for

VLAN tags, allowing large numbers of

isolated layer 2 networks to coexist

on a common layer 3 infrastructure.

Because VXLAN uses a 24-bit ID, a single

network can support up to 16 million LAN

IDs, effectively extending beyond the

limitations of the VLAN address space.

Technologies supporting

an evolving architecture

To help drive the transformation of the

network architecture, Intel and Dell have

enhanced their respective technologies to

support NVOs based on VXLAN. Use of

VXLAN introduces an additional layer

of packet processing at the hypervisor

level. For each packet on the VXLAN

network, the hypervisor needs to add,

or encapsulate, protocol headers on the

sender side and remove, or decapsulate,

these headers on the receiver side. This

processing adds to the host server’s CPU

load. Some network interface card (NIC)

offload capabilities can be used with

VXLAN, but they depend on the physical

NIC and the driver.

VXLAN gateways, also called VXLAN

Tunnel End Points (VTEPs), provide

encapsulation and decapsulation services

to allow nonvirtualized network traffic to

communicate with VXLAN virtualized

network traffic. VTEPs can be virtual

Abstracting data center boundaries using VXLAN

VXLAN

Disjoint layer 2 network makes forisolated pockets of compute resources.

VXLAN overlays over existing networks,enabling compute resources to be pooled.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 53

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

software bridges in the hypervisor or VXLAN-

capable switching hardware. The Dell

Networking S6000 switch supports VXLAN

and acts as a layer 2 gateway for the VMware®

NSX™ network virtualization platform.1

To address the performance impact of

encapsulation, Intel tuned its 10 Gigabit Ethernet

(10GbE) Intel® Ethernet Controllers to support

receive-side scaling (RSS) technology. RSS

accelerates VXLAN traffic by distributing the

traffic among various queues and CPU cores.

This capability is enabled in a VMware ESX®

asynchronous driver from Dell, and is supported

by the 10GbE Intel® Ethernet Converged Network

Adapter X520 family or Intel Ethernet Converged

Network Adapter X540 family in a VMware

vSphere® 5.1 or later environment.

For the additional performance requirements

of VXLAN traffic over 40 Gigabit Ethernet (40GbE),

Intel has demonstrated hardware-assist offloads

that it expects to build into the next-generation

40GbE Intel Ethernet Controller, code-named

Fortville. The combination of RSS for User

Datagram Protocol (UDP) traffic and stateless

offloads for overlay traffic is designed to enable

near-native line rates for VXLAN in Linux®

OS- and VMware-based environments.2

In addition, Dell PowerEdge R720 servers

powered by the Intel® Xeon® processor E5-2600

v2 product family help deliver the performance

required for virtualizing networks using NVOs.

Powerful capabilities

for multi-tenant clouds

Cloud deployments can benefit from the agility,

efficiency and security that network virtualization

offers. Because VXLAN abstracts data center

boundaries, VMs are virtually layer 2 adjacent,

regardless of physical location within the data

center. The overlay on top of existing layer 3

boundaries enables all compute resources to be

pooled together as a cloud resource.

By delivering networking as part of a pooled,

automated infrastructure, network virtualization

can revolutionize multi-tenant VMware vCloud®

deployments. Network virtualization enables

flexible VM placement without reconfiguration,

helping reduce operational complexity.

A virtualized network can be designed to

ensure multi-tenant isolation, scalability and

performance. Also, network virtualization

enables workloads to be seamlessly migrated

to the cloud while preserving policies,

VM settings and IP addresses.

Hosting service providers can offer a

VMware vCloud environment in which

a tenant brings its own IP address and

network topology to create its own

sandbox environment — without the provider

needing to coordinate between multiple

tenants. A VMware vCloud deployment

with VXLAN also enables an organization to

extend its data center into a hybrid cloud

by simply placing its infrastructure into the

virtual, abstracted environment without any

other changes.

Virtualization’s next frontier

Extensive virtualization of servers and storage

in many data centers leaves the network as the

next great frontier for virtualization. In today’s

competitive business environment, IT decision

makers continue to look for technologies

and tools that help enterprises quickly bring

services to market, grow their revenues and

reduce costs. These goals are why many

leaders are actively evaluating the current state

of their infrastructure to see how network

virtualization and SDN fit into their plans.

The logical abstraction enabled by network

virtualization drives agility and streamlines

network management, delivering the flexibility,

control and automation required for today’s

data centers.

Learn more

Advanced Ethernet connectivity

from Intel and Dell:

IntelEthernet-Dell.com

Authors

Brian Johnson is a solutions

architect in the networking

division at Intel for networking and

virtualization technologies.

Rich Hernandez is a networking

technologist at Dell working on

server products, including GbE

and 10GbE for rack, tower and

modular servers.

1 Dell expects to release software support to enable the VXLAN capability in the Dell Networking S6000 switch in early 2014. For more information about the Dell Networking S6000 switch, see “Bridging physical and virtual networks with ease and efficiency,” by Kamesh Kothuri and James Wynia, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/ud3n8xl.

2 Demonstrated at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco, California, in September 2013.

Dell and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

54 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

A major shift has been underway in the

data center, as workloads continue

to diversify and IT infrastructure

transitions from physical to virtual.

Growth in cloud deployments and virtualization —

in particular, virtual desktops — is driving the

need for increased server density, as well as

additional storage and bandwidth. According

to Forrester Research, 46 percent of surveyed

enterprises planned to invest in private

clouds in 2013.1

To support increased densities, data centers

face rising costs for cooling and power. At the

same time, enterprise networks are experiencing

heightened east-west traffic — traffic between

and within racks — from the demands of modern

application deployments and continued virtual

machine expansion.

Even as virtualization and cloud computing

take hold, the traditional three-tier network

design has not changed in step with other

data center advances. Virtual workloads are

still bound by the constraints of the physical

network. In addition, scaling the network

infrastructure to accommodate a new

generation of virtualized workloads can be

disruptive and challenging. As a result, some

IT groups struggle to support organizational

and strategic initiatives as they contend with

potential service disruption, added management

costs and growing operational complexity.

As virtual networks proliferate, network

and server administrators must work together

to effectively integrate virtual and physical

infrastructures. This integration is essential to

the orchestration and automation of virtual

machine provisioning and migration. Virtual

networks route traffic between virtual machines

in the stack, but it is the physical network

that connects these virtual environments to

the outside world. Virtual environments

consume services offered by nonvirtualized,

physical infrastructure components, which

offer dedicated load balancing, firewall, wide

area network (WAN) optimization and virtual

private network (VPN) services. Moreover,

the physical network interconnects data

centers for global load balancing, backup and

disaster recovery. The need for a scalable

and fault-tolerant fabric that supports

continuous operation across both physical

and virtual environments becomes progressively

evident as the network continues to mature

and enterprises realize that traditional

approaches are draining power, cooling and

operational budgets.

Bridging physical and virtual networks with ease and efficiency

Virtualization and network simplification are top priorities for IT

strategists. The high-performance Dell Networking S6000 switch

streamlines operations and acts as a gateway to bridge and unify

physical and virtual environments in the data center.

By Kamesh Kothuri and James Wynia

1 “The Forrester Wave™: Hosted Private Cloud, Q1 2013,” by Lauren E. Nelson with James Staten, Christopher Voce, William Martorelli and Heather Belanger, Forrester Research, Inc., February 2013.

Dive deeper

Download this spec sheet to get the scoop on the Dell Networking S6000, a high-performance 10/40GbE switch for virtualized data centers.

qrs.ly/313ogfz

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 55

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Accelerating data center performance

To support evolving network architectures,

Dell has expanded its networking portfolio

with the Dell Networking S6000 switch,

an industry-leading 1RU 10/40 Gigabit

Ethernet (10/40GbE) switching system

purpose-built for virtualized data centers.

Providing up to 2.56 Tbps of switching

I/O bandwidth and sub-600 ns latency,

the S6000 allows network administrators

to aggressively invest in fast 10/40GbE

switching and connectivity for in-rack

server and storage components. Moreover,

the switch is engineered to support

network virtualization and software-defined

networking (SDN) paradigms.

The S6000 provides up to 96 ports of

10GbE and 8 additional ports of 40GbE

or 32 ports of 40GbE, all within a 1RU

rack-mount chassis. The exceptional

performance and port density of the S6000

enable network managers to accommodate

demanding workloads and the large

amounts of traffic they generate between

servers and storage in racks and rows. The

S6000 is a versatile switch that can be used

in top-of-rack, middle-of-row, end-of-row

and leaf-spine deployments (see figure).

Ethernet deployment

As a top-of-rack switch, the S6000 delivers

10/40GbE connectivity for traditional

Ethernet and layer 2 fabrics across the

data center. In a typical 40GbE top-of-rack

deployment, the switch can provide high-

performance connectivity in a high-density

compute rack that hosts demanding,

mission-critical servers and storage.

For maximum flexibility, the S6000 can

connect multiple racks in efficient middle-

of-row or end-of-row configurations.

These types of deployments help reduce

the need for a switch in each rack, thereby

delivering cost-effective consolidation of

networking functions.

The S6000 also can be configured as

an aggregation switch for enterprise data

center environments that support high-

performance computing (HPC), Web 2.0,

big data and other challenging workloads.

Active Fabric implementation

A Dell Active Fabric, which is built on a

foundation of robust components designed

for high-performance environments, is

well suited for connecting servers, storage

and software in virtualized data centers. In

a leaf-spine architecture, the S6000 can

be deployed as an Active Fabric leaf node

connected to a high-performance spine

switch, such as the Dell Networking Z9000.

This flat, two-tier, nonblocking configuration

helps accelerate east-west traffic to

optimize application performance.

Unifying physical and virtual environments

When developing the Dell Networking

S6000, Dell worked closely with VMware

to deliver layer 2 gateway functionality that

enables data centers to efficiently bridge

virtualized and nonvirtualized components

in an IT infrastructure. The S6000 supports

Virtual Extensible LAN (VXLAN), an industry-

standard protocol for extending virtual

environments across layer 2 and layer 3

boundaries.2 VXLAN is an overlay technology

that enables creation of large, virtual, layer 2

networks — also known as Network

Virtualization Overlays (NVOs) — on top of

physical layer 2 and layer 3 networks.3

The S6000 works as a layer 2 gateway

to enable physical workloads on virtual

LANs (VLANs) to be connected to

logical networks on demand. The switch

provides hardware-based acceleration

Deployment models for the Dell Networking S6000 switch

40GbE Active Fabric

Dell NetworkingZ9000

Dell Networking S6000 Dell Networking S6000 Dell Networking S6000

Dell PowerEdge M1000e enclosure with Dell NetworkingMXL 10/40GbE blade switch and PowerEdge M420 and

PowerEdge M620 blade servers

Dell servers and storageDell servers and storageEnd of row Middle of row Top of rack

High-performance Dell Active Fabric leaf node10/40GbE end-of-row, middle-of-row and top-of-rack switching

Dell servers

Dell NetworkingZ9000 spine

40GbE

Dell Networking S6000 leaf

2 Dell expects to release software support to enable the VXLAN capability in the Dell Networking S6000 switch in early 2014.

3 “For more information about VXLAN and network virtualization, see “Continuing the transformational journey toward peak network agility,” by Brian Johnson and Rich Hernandez, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/o13ogg1.

56 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

for VXLAN traffic from virtual networks to

communicate with VLAN-based physical

infrastructure components.

Administrators can combine the

gateway functionality of the S6000 with the

network virtualization capabilities of the

VMware NSX™ platform to create NVOs

(see figure). By pooling network resources

and abstracting network functionality from

underlying hardware, VMware NSX allows

flexible workload placement and virtual

machine mobility.

The S6000 and VMware NSX facilitate

virtual machines in virtual networks to

consume services offered by physical

servers, storage, load balancers, firewalls,

WAN optimization controllers and other

special-purpose components. Also, the

joint solution enables large multi-tenant

and virtual services deployments. By

helping unify nonvirtualized and virtualized

infrastructure, the S6000 layer 2 gateway

works together with VMware NSX to deliver

exceptional operational efficiency.

Gaining visibility and control

Administrators can manage the network

fabric, including the Dell Networking

S6000, using Dell Active Fabric Manager

(AFM) 2.0,4 a network orchestration

tool that is designed to automate tasks

associated with designing, building and

monitoring Active Fabric elements. AFM

provides an intuitive graphical interface to

help network managers design, build and

run an optimal fabric, helping eliminate

guesswork and human error.

AFM 2.0 adds command-line interface

(CLI) functionality specifically developed for

the VMware vSphere® Distributed Switch. The

CLI provides network administrators with a

familiar, consistent means of visibility into

and management of both virtual and physical

networks. Now, instead of the VMware

vCenter™ management platform used by

server and virtualization administrators,

network administrators can utilize the

industry-standard command-line syntax and

the common design templates of AFM to

minimize deployment time for both layer 2

and layer 3 fabrics.

The CLI fosters cooperation between

cloud, server, virtual machine and network

administrators. With the insight on virtual

networks that the CLI provides, network

administrators have the opportunity to take

the lead in educating other administrators on

networking concepts. Network administrators

can also engage the other administrators in a

conversation about deploying network

virtualization, as well as facilitating service

consumption on physical infrastructure

components and virtual machine mobility

across the entire data center.

Moreover, administrators can manage

the S6000 using Dell OpenManage

Network Manager, which provides a single

web-based console for one-to-many

management functionality, as well as easy

monitoring and diagnosis of networking

health and performance.

Streamlining operations

The Dell Networking S6000 offers several

built-in management and automation

features to help administrators accelerate

deployment and simplify network operations.

The S6000 is supported by the Dell

Networking Open Automation Framework,

which adds automated configuration,

scripting and provisioning capabilities for

virtual data center environments. The Open

Automation Framework comprises a suite

of interrelated network management tools

that can be used together or independently.

Tools include Bare Metal Provisioning (BMP)

for rapid and automated deployments;

Perl, Python and Tcl scripting for maximum

programmability and interworking

with development operations; and

programmable management mechanisms

such as Simple Network Management

Protocol (SNMP) and management

information bases (MIBs).

In addition, the S6000 operates

on industry-hardened Dell Networking

Operating System, enabling robust operation

for demanding networks. (For more

information, see the sidebar, “Consistent

performance for real-world networks.”)

Achieving scale and efficiency

through high density and low

power consumption

Network managers can leverage high port

densities of the Dell Networking S6000

Dell Networking S6000VXLAN gateway

VXLANBare-metal servers

Virtualmachines Virtual network

Layer 2

Layer 2

Layer 3

VMware NSX

Layer 2 gateway functionality of the Dell Networking S6000 switch

4 Dell plans to release Dell Active Fabric Manager 2.0 in early 2014.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 57

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

to handle massive increases in server and

storage density needed for expanding

virtual environments. At current virtual

machine density levels, many enterprises

may already be operating at near-maximum

capacity afforded by their current data

center architectures. To conserve precious

rack space and enable dense footprints, the

S6000 provides a large number of ports in

a compact 1RU form factor. And because

the S6000 is twice as dense as previous-

generation Dell top-of-rack switches, such

as the S4810, the S6000 is designed to

consume up to half the power per port —

leading to a 50 percent power savings.

The S6000 also uses fresh-air cooling

technology similar to that employed by

Dell servers, which enables it to operate

at higher-than-typical temperatures.

The S6000 is validated for Dell Fresh Air

cooling deployments along with Dell

servers and storage components. By

leveraging the thermal features engineered

into the Fresh Air portfolio of equipment,

operators can run data centers at higher

temperatures than usual — up to 113

degrees Fahrenheit (45 degrees Celsius)

with humidity spikes up to 90 percent —

helping them save on infrastructure costs

and overall energy consumption.

Bringing networks into the

virtual world

The fundamental nature of data center

computing is rapidly changing. Today’s

enterprise networks must evolve to

support modern, on-demand, virtualized

IT environments. The Dell Networking

S6000 switch is a key enabler of this

evolution, delivering the business agility

and efficient, high-density operation

needed for demanding data center and

virtualized network environments. The

switch’s high port density allows network

managers to design flexible network

architectures using the switch in top-of-rack,

end-of-row, middle-of-row, aggregate or

leaf-spine configurations.

Beyond driving workloads with

low-latency, high-throughput 10/40GbE

connectivity, the S6000 can be used as a

hardware-accelerated layer 2 gateway for

VMware NSX. In addition, SDN support for

advanced network virtualization is being

planned for release at the end of 2013.

The network virtualization capabilities

of the S6000, combined with built-in

management and automation features,

helps IT organizations efficiently scale

large virtual deployments while reducing

operational costs and resources.

Learn more

Dell Networking:

Dell.com/networking

Authors

Kamesh Kothuri is a product management,

solutions development manager at Dell with over

20 years of experience, and currently is focused

on network virtualization, application delivery and

infrastructure management.

James Wynia is director of marketing, product

management at Dell, with 13 years at Dell and

Force10 Networks. He is currently supporting

numerous Dell networking programs.

Dell and OpenManage are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Consistent performance for real-world networksMature, feature-rich Dell Networking Operating System (OS) powers the Dell

Networking product portfolio. Dell Networking OS has been tested and hardened

through deployment in large, demanding global networks to meet stringent

reliability, scalability and serviceability requirements. Dell Networking OS enables

enterprises to cost-effectively build end-to-end, dependable networks while driving

down operational costs and management overhead.

The advanced features and modular design of Dell Networking OS provide a

number of operational advantages:

• Consistency: To enable simple management and low total cost of network

ownership, a common, industry-standard interface is used across the

Dell Networking switch portfolio. Consistent configuration, diagnostics,

troubleshooting and unified maintenance across platforms help reduce

downtime, speed training and minimize retraining, while simplifying network

lifecycle management.

• Reliability: Industry-hardened, modular Dell Networking OS is designed to deliver

exceptional reliability and nonstop operation for mission-critical workloads.

• Scalability: Dedicated and automated testing resources for each active network

feature help ensure that individual processes can scale under load.

• Serviceability: Inline monitoring and diagnostic tools facilitate troubleshooting

without system shutdown or disruption, minimizing unplanned downtime.

Dell Networking OS powers a growing family of Dell Networking C-Series,

E-Series, S-Series and Z-Series switches.

58 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

With the explosive growth of

social media, customers

are increasingly taking

their conversations

to online platforms such as Twitter,

Facebook, community forums, wikis

and blogs. Because social media has the

power to influence brand reputation,

daily engagement with people who are

discussing an organization’s brand has

become a critical step for understanding

the market — and in some cases, converting

detractors into brand advocates.

Through social media analytics,

organizations can determine who is

doing the talking: Are they customers,

influencers or others? They can find out

when specific events caused positive or

negative conversations and also measure

general brand sentiment on a daily, weekly

and monthly basis. This rich data enables

enterprises to obtain real-time customer

insights that can help solve complex

business challenges.

Taking a journey

to optimized analytics

The development of a social media

analytics strategy can be thought of as a

journey that begins by listening to online

conversations. The next steps are to

collect, record and analyze the data, and

then monitor trends. Finally, heuristics and

business algorithms are applied to the data

to derive actionable insights.

This journey from an ad hoc approach

to a highly optimized solution does not

happen overnight but in increments, as

an enterprise develops analytics maturity.

How social media analytics transform conversations into insights

Conversations carried out in diverse online channels

can strongly affect an organization’s brand reputation.

The Social Net Advocacy metric from Dell helps

organizations embrace the power of social media

to stay competitive and relevant.

By Shree Dandekar

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 59

Features

To achieve this maturity, business leaders

need to make the right investments in

technology, and then invest in training

people and creating a social media analytics

culture within the organization.

Dell is developing a social media

analytics portfolio that enables enterprises

to leverage the power of social media

wherever they are on the analytics

journey. For instance, offerings from

Dell Social Media Services are built to

help organizations across a variety of

industries develop real-time customer

insights, engage audiences and deepen

understanding of their customers and

the market.

Calculating sentiment through

an innovative metric

The Dell social media analytics portfolio

includes the patent-pending Social Net

Advocacy (SNA) metric. SNA is designed to

measure the net advocacy of a brand or topic,

calculated from the sentiment and context

of social media conversations (see figure).

Dell uses SNA internally to help the

company deliver an enhanced experience

to its customers. SNA is integrated within

the Dell Social Media Command Center,

which enables the company to monitor and

react to online conversations in real time.

Dell measures SNA at the brand level

and also extends this measurement

to more than 150 topics representing

various aspects of the business. Online

conversations are analyzed for topics

including products, services, marketing,

customer support, packaging and even

community outreach efforts. Each of these

conversations influences brand perception

and therefore affects the overall advocacy

or health of the brand.

SNA enables organizations to

understand, quantify and contextualize

online feedback, leading to informed

business decisions that help improve the

overall customer experience. Organizations

can integrate customer feedback in

near-real time for short response cycles —

meaning that an organization can quickly

connect with a customer and discuss

relevant solutions.

Discovering the potential

of social media analytics

Enterprises can use SNA to address a

host of business challenges. For example,

after announcing a product, a retailer can

measure the impact of the announcement

in real time by tracking any product

feedback found in online conversations.

The retailer could then convert these

conversations into meaningful metrics

to track success. Other use cases for

applying SNA in social media analytics

include the following:

• Product development: Primary

research, early warning systems,

new product ideation

• Marketing: Instant feedback on

campaigns; enhancements of product

messaging, offers and promotions; search

engine marketing and optimization

• Net promoter score (NPS) diagnosis:

Issue identification and tracking, NPS

prediction based on SNA

• Sales: Lead generation and scoring

• Customer service and support:

Prioritization of support issues, expansion

of coverage

• Mergers and acquisitions: Research on

potential acquisitions, customer reaction

to upcoming acquisitions

Dell is seeking organizations to participate

in a beta program that tests SNA on a subset

of an organization’s brands or products.

The beta program is a two- to three-month

effort that includes discovery, deployment

and training. For more information about

the program, contact Shree Dandekar on

Twitter @shree_dandekar or email him at

Shree_Dandekar@Dell.com.

Making sense of online conversations using Social Net Advocacy (SNA)

Author

Shree Dandekar is the director of business

intelligence strategy at Dell. Follow Shree on

Twitter at @shree_dandekar.

Dell is a trademark of Dell Inc.

AggregateGather conversations

about an organization, theindustry and competitors

EnrichFilter, categorize anddetermine sentiment

CollateCalculate SNA to determinebrand and product advocacy

DeliverTrack and monitor SNAin real time and obtain

actionable insights

1.

2.

3.

ListenMonitor onlineconversations

1 2 3 4 5

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

60 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Data center modernization helps

decision makers boost operational

flexibility, efficiency and cost-

effectiveness by integrating and

optimizing business applications, supporting

databases and IT infrastructure.1 As part of their

modernization plans, many organizations are

considering updating their SAP applications

and databases to take advantage of the latest

functionality and enhance business insights. At the

same time, migration from UNIX®-based systems

to x86-based servers running the Linux® OS helps

enterprises reduce costs to boost competitiveness.

However, interrupting normal operations for

an IT migration presents significant challenges.

Many SAP applications and databases are mission

critical and demand round-the-clock availability,

but traditional upgrades and migrations often

require prolonged downtime. Even an extra

hour or two of downtime may dramatically

reduce an organization’s productivity, disrupt

customer service and result in unacceptable

financial losses. Organizations need a way to

meet their goals and service-level agreements

(SLAs) without increasing costs and the risk of

downtime and data loss.

SAP and Dell are working together to help

enterprises move toward a modernized data

center — one that scales out easily and efficiently

and does not demand costly and frequent

disruptive upgrades — while maintaining high

availability of mission-critical systems.

Overcoming the challenge of maintaining

proprietary platforms

Many organizations have valuable assets in SAP

applications running on aging, proprietary systems

that have served them well for years. By upgrading

outdated SAP software, IT leaders can enhance

functionality for mobile users and effectively turn rapidly

growing volumes of data into actionable insight.

However, updating applications on

legacy UNIX-based systems can lead to high

maintenance and software licensing costs, which

intensify the pressure on already constrained

IT budgets. Moreover, organizations may have

difficulty introducing new business services on

maturing platforms.

Instead, IT decision makers can upgrade their

SAP applications and migrate critical SAP assets

to industry-standard x86-based systems running

open-source Linux. Replacing proprietary systems

with fewer, more energy-efficient x86-based Linux

servers helps reduce operating expenses and avoid

data center expansion costs. Besides heightening

efficiency, updated systems boost performance to

Moving enterprise applications to efficient, cost-effective platforms helps

organizations gain a competitive edge. Discover how Dell and SAP modernization

solutions help cut migration risk while avoiding costly, prolonged downtime.

By Karthik Konaparthi, Wendy Williams and Maggie Smith

Modernizing SAP environments with minimal downtime and risk

1 For more information about data center modernization, see “Taking a holistic approach to data center modernization,” by Vikram Belapurkar and Wendy Williams, in Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4, qrs.ly/hz3n8xp.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 61

Features

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support additional application functionality

and intensified throughput workloads.

When moving to an x86-based system,

organizations also have the option of

updating their existing database platform

or taking the opportunity to migrate to

an alternative one. Overall, a migration

to an x86-based infrastructure and open-

source operating systems such as Linux

helps reduce operational costs for system

maintenance, software licensing, staffing

and energy usage.

Adopting an infrastructure well suited

for today’s SAP workloads

To be an optimal migration target, the

x86-based infrastructure should fully

support the SAP stack, from database to

application. Dell has developed a Dell

Active Infrastructure solution to meet the

needs of an SAP migration. Dell Active

Infrastructure converges servers, storage,

networking and infrastructure systems

management to streamline implementation

and management. (For more information,

see the sidebar, “A converged approach for

accelerating time to value.”)

Part of the Dell Active Infrastructure

portfolio is the Dell Active System line of

pre-engineered, pre-integrated systems that

help simplify the move from proprietary

systems to open, standards-based architecture.

Dell Active Systems are designed to provide

the following advantages:

• Exceptional business agility: Organizations

can rapidly respond to changing workload

and user demands with converged

infrastructure for SAP application

deployments as well as for private cloud

and virtualization implementations.

• Fast time to value: Dell Active Systems

dramatically help reduce the time

organizations spend on designing,

procuring, deploying, integrating and

testing for data center modernization.

• Outstanding IT efficiency: Organizations

can concentrate on rolling out and

managing applications rather than

setting up infrastructure. Field-tested

Dell server, storage, networking and

management technology helps limit

interoperability issues.

Migrating to Dell Active Infrastructure

also makes it easy for organizations to

leverage SAP® HANA® software for fast,

cost-effective access to data for analysis.

The Dell | SAP HANA solution combines

SAP HANA software, enterprise-class

Dell hardware and expert services that

enable business users to execute

analytics, performance management and

operations using optimized, in-memory

computing capabilities.2

Despite the promise of significant

business benefits, some organizations may

be skeptical based on previous experiences

of significant disruptions during the transition

to an updated SAP environment. Using

traditional approaches, they may have had

to shut down their business or stop offering

certain aspects of their services for several

hours or even days. Dell ZeroIMPACT

Migration Services for SAP applications are

designed to ensure the availability of mission-

critical SAP systems during the transition to

an updated IT environment.

2 For more information about the Dell | SAP HANA solution, see “Applying real-time analytics for agile business operations,” by Carey Dietert and Divyesh Vaidya, in Dell Power Solutions, 2012 Issue 4, qrs.ly/zo3n8xq.

Features

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Features

Supporting continued productivity

through nondisruptive modernization

Dell ZeroIMPACT Migration Services enable

organizations to gain the full potential of

an updated platform while avoiding the

costly and prolonged planned outage

windows associated with traditional

approaches. (For more information, see

the sidebar, “At a glance: Dell ZeroIMPACT

Migration Services.”) Through this

program, organizations can nondisruptively

upgrade or change their OS and/or

database as part of an SAP modernization

project — for example, by moving from

one version of Oracle® Database to

another or from Oracle Database to the

Sybase® database.

During the ZeroIMPACT process, Dell

Services consultants start with an analysis

of an organization’s applications, processes

and users to understand required features and

functionalities before developing a specific

migration plan. The consultants then

work with the organization to manage

all aspects of SAP system upgrades and

migration, from planning and start-up to

functional development activities to the

go-live event and support.

To help confirm that the target platform

will perform as expected before beginning

a full migration project, Dell Services can

test the performance and functionality of

the planned target platform. With Dell Test

Harness Service for SAP, Dell consultants

export a sample of an organization’s current

SAP data to the cloud and run the workload

in both the existing and the planned

environment. The performance of both

platforms’ databases can then be compared

using Dell Foglight technology to help

validate the planned environment.

Embracing innovative technologies

Limitations of legacy systems and day-to-

day operating requirements can make it

difficult for organizations to adopt advanced

technologies, such as cloud computing

and virtualization, that drive business

opportunities. Modernization efforts open

up innovative technology avenues, leverage

new capabilities in updated applications

and consolidate infrastructure to better

A converged approach for accelerating time to valueWhen moving to a standards-based environment, organizations can take advantage

of the considerable benefits of converged infrastructure. Converged infrastructure

integrates multiple IT components to enhance the efficiency, agility and resiliency of the

IT organization. When these components — including servers, networking and storage —

are combined into a single solution, their collective resources can be pooled and shared

effectively. Converged infrastructure also enables organizations to simplify and centralize

the management of those resources to achieve significant cost savings.

Dell bases its Active Infrastructure converged solutions on open architecture,

flexible delivery models and unified support to help organizations achieve an

automated data center platform. Dell Active Infrastructure accelerates the delivery of

IT services with workload-optimized, pre-integrated systems. It also provides validated

reference architectures, template-based automation and end-to-end support.

The result is a converged infrastructure that enables organizations to maximize

efficiency, respond rapidly to changing business needs and deliver consistent, high-

quality IT services.

Part of the Dell Active Infrastructure family, the Dell Active System 800 is a pre-integrated, converged platform that enables easy-to-manage private clouds and business applications.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 63

Authors

Karthik Konaparthi is a marketing

manager in the Enterprise Solutions Group

at Dell and is currently focused on cloud

and big data solutions.

Wendy Williams is a marketing manager

for Dell Services. She is focused on

application services and has over 15 years

of experience marketing IT solutions,

including application modernization.

Maggie Smith is a senior marketing

manager at Dell. She is focused on

enterprise solutions for database and big

data applications and has over 30 years of

experience marketing technology products.

Learn more

Dell and SAP:

Dell.com/SAP

Dell converged infrastructure:

qrs.ly/ub3ogg2

Dell Services:

Dell.com/services

SAP modernization solutions from Dell:

SAP_Modernization@dell.com

manage growth. Moreover, migration to

an updated infrastructure helps lower total

cost of ownership.

Modernization solutions from Dell and

SAP enable organizations to move forward

with IT initiatives and process more data

on less hardware while freeing scarce IT

resources. Dell Active Infrastructure offers a

high-performance virtualized solution and

converged infrastructure that supports the SAP

solution stack. Additionally, Dell ZeroIMPACT

Migration Services for SAP applications

enable organizations to quickly move from

legacy environments to open, x86-based

infrastructure with minimal downtime for

continued end-user productivity.

At a glance: Dell ZeroIMPACT Migration ServicesTo aid organizations in their transition to contemporary

environments with minimal downtime, Dell provides ZeroIMPACT

Migration Services for SAP applications. Dell Services also offers

business-critical support, expertise and practical experience to

help eliminate the risks associated with migration.

The platform-agnostic ZeroIMPACT solution provides

replication for UNIX, Linux or Windows systems. The service

supports Oracle-to-Oracle and Oracle-to-SAP Sybase Adaptive

Server Enterprise (ASE) migrations. In addition, it supports

replication of all current SAP data types, including LONG columns,

large objects (LOB) and more.

During a ZeroIMPACT migration, the current production

system operates as usual, enabling users to interact with

the system and maintain business continuity throughout the

process (see figure). First, the new production system is

established with the updated SAP applications and preferred

database. Dell consultants then deploy Dell SharePlex

technology, which uses change data capture abilities to

track modifications to the current production database.

Next, the current production database is cloned on a staging

system while the current production system continues to run. Then,

the newly cloned database is imported from the staging system

to the new production system. Once the new production

system has been instantiated, SharePlex reconciles and syncs

any database changes made during the migration process to the

new production database. Then, users are switched to the new

production system.

Database replication using the Dell ZeroIMPACT migration approach

Current productionsystem (UNIX, Oracle)

Staging system(UNIX, Oracle)

Clone

New production system(Linux, Oracle or Sybase)

SharePlex

Export/im

port

Dell, Foglight and SharePlex are trademarks of Dell Inc.

64 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Graphics processing units (GPUs)

enable important breakthroughs in a

variety of business and professional

applications, such as creating

products, designing buildings or reviewing fine

details in an MRI scan. Without a GPU, processes

such as design, imaging, simulation and content

creation can be slow and inefficient.

A product designer, for instance, might

need to design one portion of a product, start a

simulation or rendering process and then come

back the next morning to see the results before

moving onto the next portion. This interrupted

workflow and delay potentially can reduce

productivity, increase project costs and affect

product quality.

To overcome such challenges, many Dell

Precision workstations are equipped with

NVIDIA Quadro® or NVIDIA Tesla® GPUs to

help speed up graphically or computationally

demanding workloads. Additionally, the

introduction of NVIDIA GRID™ technology in Dell

PowerEdge servers expands the benefits of GPU

acceleration to virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI).

The performance demands of visual and high-performance computing call for a powerful

engine to keep pace. Dell computers use NVIDIA® graphics processors to enhance business

and scientific processing as well as the virtual desktop user experience.

By Michael Lasen, Maximilian LeRoux and Travis Wells

Accelerating applications and virtual desktops with GPUs

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 65

Features

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Expediting graphics-intensive and computational workloads

Designed for graphics workloads, Quadro GPUs boost performance

by enabling applications to offload the graphics-intensive visualization

processes to the GPU, while the remainder of the code still runs

on the CPU. From an end user’s perspective, applications run

significantly faster.

The CPU-plus-GPU combination is powerful. While CPUs

consist of a few cores geared toward general processing, GPUs

comprise thousands of smaller, more efficient cores optimized for

specific types of tasks.

Quadro GPUs power graphics-intensive professional

applications across a broad range of industries, from medical

imaging to filmmaking and animation. For example, with the help

of Quadro GPUs, Pixomondo created critical scenes for the film

“Star Trek Into Darkness.” Pixomondo was challenged with creating

380 pivotal shots that would satisfy the expectations of a devoted

fan base. To do this, Pixomondo utilized Dell Precision T7600

and Dell Precision T5500 workstations equipped with Quadro

K4000 graphics cards. The NVIDIA and Dell technology enabled

Pixomondo to explore new areas inside the iconic starship USS

Enterprise and push the limits on action-packed film sequences.

Architected for computational workloads, Tesla GPU Accelerators

are designed to deliver about an order of magnitude more double-

precision floating-point performance than CPUs at higher efficiency.

Tesla GPU Accelerators perform the complex calculations required

for work such as genomics and bioinformatics research; big data

analytics; energy exploration; computational fluid dynamics;

computational physics; and climate, weather and ocean modeling.

In one case, Tesla GPU Accelerators enabled the Life Technologies

Corporation Ion Proton® system to expedite next-generation genome

sequencing — the computation that generates DNA base pairs. The

GPU acceleration used in the Ion Proton system allows laboratories to

quickly and easily sequence the human genome, potentially leading

to innovations in life sciences and advances in clinical research.

Integrating multiple GPUs for exceptional performance

Dell workstations powered by NVIDIA Maximus™ technology feature

multiple Quadro graphics or Tesla compute GPUs. Applications that

support multiple GPUs enable excellent performance scalability,

because each additional GPU contributes processing power to boost

the speed and efficiency of the workflow. Tesla GPU Accelerators are

designed to automatically perform the heavy lifting of computation,

freeing the Quadro GPUs to enable rich interactive graphics.

Maximus allows product engineers to design and render on a

single workstation without bogging it down, and it enables media

and entertainment creators to edit layers and effects in real time.

Energy researchers can use Maximus to view and interact with

immense seismic data sets.

An Olympic feat: Fast and green designA relatively small firm with only six architects, Castro

Mello Architects of Brazil is able to compete on a global

scale through the smart use of technology. The firm

was selected to design the Estádio Nacional de Brasilia

stadium as Brasilia prepares to host next year’s Fédération

Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) World Cup

2014. And although the bulk of the 2016 Summer Olympic

Games will take place in Rio de Janeiro, Olympic soccer

matches will be played at Estádio Nacional de Brasilia,

São Paulo and Belo Horizonte.

With such a high-profile project, Castro Mello

Architects was determined to show the world that high-

performance stadiums could be profitable examples of

green-building success. That meant devising inventive

ways to create building efficiencies. The work required

compute-intensive rendering of hundreds of computer-

generated images.

Combining NVIDIA Quadro and Tesla GPUs in an

NVIDIA Maximus–powered configuration on Dell Precision

T7500 workstations, the company was able to generate

test renders of design revisions in as fast as 30 seconds,

a process that was previously taking up to eight hours.

Working on the Maximus-enabled workstations, architects

tested different design permutations to assess how best

to maximize natural resources, which helped reduce the

overall energy load of the stadium.

With these and other building efficiencies, the Brasilia

stadium is estimated to realize energy savings of up to

120 percent per year — possibly becoming the first

Net-Zero Energy stadium in the world.

66 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Castro Mello Architects of Brazil discovered the

advantages of Maximus when it was awarded the

design of a coveted stadium project. The firm was

able to reduce the time required for rendering

computer-generated images from hours to

seconds. (For more information, see the sidebar,

“An Olympic feat: Fast and green design.”)

Virtualizing the GPU for a heightened

user experience

NVIDIA GRID technology puts the power of

the GPU into the data center to deliver GPU-

accelerated applications and virtual desktops

over the network. Now available for the Dell

PowerEdge R720 server, GRID boards feature the

NVIDIA Kepler™ architecture that, for the first time,

allows hardware virtualization of the GPU.

IT managers can now add graphics-intensive

users to virtual machines, while heightening

the productivity of current VDI users. End

users can expect to experience low-latency

performance in graphically intensive applications.

Organizations benefit by taking advantage of

centralized security and management while

maintaining high performance for workstation

applications. With VDI, organizations can avoid

storing sensitive data or proprietary software

in remote locations or at employees’ and

contractors’ desks.

One usage model is to enable remote

workstation-class performance for power users

who need dedicated GPUs. The GRID pass-through

technology provides a leading-edge Quadro

experience for designers, artists and scientists

who rely on applications requiring interactive

3D graphics. NVIDIA has enabled all Quadro

professional drivers and support for NVIDIA CUDA®,

Microsoft® DirectX® and OpenGL® application

programming interfaces (APIs) in the company’s

virtual workstation solutions to help ensure full

certification by application companies.

Another use case is to allow multiple virtual

machines to share the graphics processing power

of a single GPU. Virtual desktop solutions with

shared GPUs help improve user density while

delivering a graphics-rich experience for all

users. With the advanced NVIDIA GRID vGPU™

technology, the graphics commands of each

virtual machine are passed directly to the GPU

without translation by the hypervisor. This pass-

through enables the GPU hardware to be time-

sliced to deliver exceptional shared virtualized

graphics performance.

Integrated with solutions from Citrix,

Microsoft or VMware, a GPU enhances

applications or content in a virtualized

environment that require rendering 2D images,

3D video or rich graphics. GRID is designed

to deliver a full PC experience to end users,

rendering their virtual desktops just like their

laptop or desktop computers do today.

Advancing business and scientific innovation

Still key to enabling sophisticated 3D gaming,

NVIDIA GPUs are also powering professional

graphics and high-performance computing

solutions. With a GPU offloading key processing

tasks from the CPU, professionals in many

industries can work more quickly and effectively

than ever before. A variety of NVIDIA technologies

are available for Dell workstations and servers,

helping deliver graphical and computational

performance and innovative capabilities that stoke

business and scientific success.

Learn more

Dell Precision workstations:

Dell.com/precision

NVIDIA GRID:

nvidia.com/vdi

Authors

Michael Lasen is a high-technology specialist at NVIDIA

who is partnered with Dell for sales of professional

graphics solutions in a wide variety of vertical markets.

Maximilian LeRoux is a global partner marketing

manager who handles Dell global strategic alliances

for graphics.

Travis Wells is a sales manager at NVIDIA who

specializes in NVIDIA technology for Dell Precision

and Dell PowerEdge products.

Dell, Dell Precision and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

NVIDIA GPUs for Dell computers

For more information, visit nvidia.com/dellpowersolutions

Professionals working with complex imaging,

simulation and graphics-heavy content creation

depend on high-performance hardware to boost

productivity. That’s why many Dell Precision

workstations and Dell PowerEdge servers are

equipped with NVIDIA® graphics processing

units (GPUs). By offloading key processing tasks

from the CPU, NVIDIA GPUs help optimize the

performance of resource-hungry applications and

enable professionals to get the job done quickly.

Top-notch performance and productivity

Sponsored content: Solution showcase

Accelerated graphicsNVIDIA Quadro® GPUs in Dell Precision workstations

help speed up demanding workloads, enabling fast

design rendering and rich interactive graphics.

High-speed computationNVIDIA Tesla® GPU Accelerators in Dell Precision

workstations and PowerEdge R720xl servers

expedite computationally intensive workloads,

freeing the CPU for general-purpose tasks.

Best of both worldsDell Precision rack workstations powered by NVIDIA

Maximus™ technology deliver a combination of

professional 3D graphics capability and high-

performance computational power.

Enhanced virtual desktopsDell PowerEdge R720 servers feature NVIDIA GRID™

technology, which enables remote workstation-class

performance with minimal lag for power users in

virtualized environments.

Dell, Dell Precision and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

68 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Innovators

Who they are

Mi-WiFi, Durban, South AfricaSoftware development company builds

a wireless guest services solution that

lets hospitality establishments offer secure

WiFi for their customers.

How they innovate

Mi-WiFi offers a simple, scalable guest authentication solution for

hotels, restaurants and other establishments to securely manage

and control access to their wireless networks. To enable secure

WiFi, Mi-WiFi integrated its flagship offering with a Dell SonicWALL

Clean Wireless solution, which combines Dell SonicWALL Next-

Generation Firewalls and Dell SonicWALL SonicPoint wireless

access points. Resellers can buy the guest services solution from

Mi-WiFi and sell it to their customers, who can customize the

interface with their own branding to grow revenue. And Mi-WiFi’s

participation in the Dell PartnerDirect program has given the

company an opportunity to expand into new markets.

Learn more

Mi-WiFi

qrs.ly/to3oh74

Dell innovatorsInnovators exist everywhere —

around the globe and in every

industry. These businesses not

only rely on Dell technology,

they take advantage of its many

benefits to make their businesses

more productive, efficient

and profitable.

Know a Dell innovator that should

be highlighted in a future issue of

Dell Power Solutions? Nominate

them @PowerSolutions.

Dell, Clean Wireless, SonicWALL and vWorkspace are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 69

Who they are

Japan Pulp and Paper Company, Tokyo, JapanPulp and paper trading company deploys

a wireless environment to deliver high-

performance mobile connectivity for its

employees, heightening workforce flexibility.

How they innovate

With the globalization of its business, Japan Pulp and Paper

Company needed to deliver secure, high-speed network access for

mobile employees. The company worked with Dell to implement a

high-performance wireless local area network (WLAN) based on the

Dell Networking W-Series wireless platform. The implementation of

the highly functional WLAN environment is part of the company’s

drive to revolutionize the way it conducts business. The WLAN

supports the company’s bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policy,

leading to increased workforce flexibility and user satisfaction.

As well, central control and management of the infrastructure,

environment and mobile devices helps ensure a seamless

experience and high service quality for users.

Learn more

Japan Pulp and Paper Company

qrs.ly/ca3oh75

Who they are

Skýrr, Reykjavik, IcelandIT services company boosts customer

retention and increases staff productivity

by 166 percent, thanks to simplified

management of its hosting environment.

How they innovate

To enhance and streamline its hardware, software, consultancy,

operations and hosting services, Skýrr sought to simplify

management of its hosting environment. The company

implemented a Dell solution featuring Dell vWorkspace, which

brokers connections and helps users manage, secure and provision

virtual desktop environments. The solution helps ensure business

continuity for the company’s customers. Moreover, the company’s

hosting services team can manage more users than before,

representing a 166 percent increase in IT staff productivity. Overall,

the increase in customer retention rates and the exceptional

efficiency enabled by the streamlined hosting service have

contributed to the growth of the company’s business.

Learn more

Skýrr

qrs.ly/kf3oh77

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

70 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Customer perspective

it enables us to manipulate those boats in a more

intelligent way than was ever possible.”

Becoming a flagship for innovation

As the America’s Cup holder from 1995 to 2003, and

the source of a US$785.9 million influx to New Zealand’s

economy, Emirates Team New Zealand is keen to

provide the nation with up-to-the-minute details on

the project. The team engaged Dell to help support

its social media platform and strategy to communicate

the brand and promote New Zealand sailing on its

website and through Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

Grant Dalton, the team’s managing director, says, “Every

time we race, the industry’s work is under intense

scrutiny from the public and the media. The Louis

Vuitton Cup and America’s Cup regattas represent the

top of the sport. It is no place for second best.”

After more than 140,000 design hours, Emirates

Team New Zealand became the first team to launch

Twice winner of the America’s Cup, Emirates Team New Zealand relies

on innovation to drive its cup dreams. In 2010, Emirates Team New

Zealand announced a bold plan to design and build two 72-foot AC72

catamarans for the 2013 Louis Vuitton Cup challenger selection series

and America’s Cup finals. Recognizing that technology would play a crucial role

in developing the AC72 multihull yachts, the team invested in a high-performance

computing (HPC) solution to test design concepts from the outset.

In previous years, computer predictions were considered only when correlated

with the physical tank data gathered using scale models. But, says the team’s

technical director, Nick Holroyd, “The transition to AC72 multihulls has meant

a complete shift in focus to technology where all our prototyping is computer

generated. Our prediction of boat performance and the design inputs required

are all derived computationally, which meant our requirements for a high-

performance cluster suddenly exploded.”

Pushing toward the design horizon

Emirates Team New Zealand discussed specific computing requirements with the

Dell HPC center at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. “Typically

we need 100 to 200 simulations to accurately measure the performance of a

potential boat design across a range of conditions, and we knew we needed to

complete so many design iterations within a certain timeframe,” says Holroyd.

“In having the opportunity to benchmark the architecture with Dell, we’ve ended

up with a machine that is specifically tailored and therefore more economical for

the workload we are demanding from it.”

By testing designs in the HPC cluster, the team increased the number of

candidates tenfold for the 2013 cup challenge. “We can now complete an entire

boat design test in three days using the Dell HPC cluster,” Holroyd says. “We’ve

gone from 30 to 40 design candidates being tested physically for our 2007 cup

campaign to testing 300 to 400 designs for this edition of the America’s Cup.”

Also, the team can fine-tune each option before the final build. “In using

computational design methods, we can examine the solution with far greater

precision than is possible with physical testing, which means we can start to

answer the critical questions that enable the team to evolve and push the limits

of design much faster,” says Holroyd. “Designing the AC72 in the Dell HPC

environment not only gives us access to a larger number of possible candidates,

Emirates Team New Zealand makes waves using a

Dell high-performance computing cluster to speed

next-generation multihull boat innovation, blazing the

way for high-speed racing at the 2013 America’s Cup.

Emirates Team New Zealand

Smooth sailing

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 71

Customer perspective

an AC72 and fly with both hulls lifted

clear of the water by hydrofoils. “We have

improved the ability to communicate with

the less technical members of the team,

because in the Dell HPC environment,

we can show them CAD models and

overlay onto the digital mock-ups the

performance characteristics of each

design,” says Holroyd. “In terms of the

way we work, the whole design evolution

has come to more closely resemble a

software development program.”

The design team, which spends as

much time on the water as off it, requires

high-performance laptops to keep up

with the frenetic pace of the America’s

Cup campaign. “Dell Latitude notebooks

provide us with the right level of data

security and performance to keep our

team operating under the most challenging

conditions,” Holroyd says.

Additionally, to work with the computer-

aided design (CAD) models for the boats,

Emirates Team New Zealand deployed

a virtualized environment featuring Dell

PowerEdge R710 servers and Dell Networking

6248 and 6224 switches. Storage for the

massive design models is provided by Dell

EqualLogic PS6000XV and EqualLogic

PS6000E storage arrays. Holroyd says, “Dell

Precision workstations and Dell Latitude

notebooks provide the file I/O performance we

need to create complete models end-to-end,

without having to resort to creating smaller

components that when bolted together may in

reality not actually match up. It’s critical to our

ability to deliver highly accurate designs for the

build, on time, that we have the performance

to support the CAD environment.”

Emirates Team New Zealand is

supported by Dell ProSupport with Mission

Critical Next Business Day OnSite Service.

“The beauty of having Dell ProSupport is

that we don’t even have to think about it,”

says Holroyd. “My job is to recruit and

manage the right people and put the right

infrastructure in place for them to exceed

in their role as designers. When we are

ready to race, it’s great to be able to put my

energy into helping the team to win and not

worry about the technology.”

Dell, Dell Precision, Dell ProSupport, EqualLogic, Latitude and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

“ We can now complete an entire boat design

test in three days using the Dell HPC cluster.

We’ve gone from 30 to 40 design candidates

being tested physically for our 2007 cup

campaign to testing 300 to 400 designs for

this edition of the America’s Cup.”– Nick Holroyd

Technical director at Emirates Team New Zealand

September 2013

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

72 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Features

When upgrading infrastructure to

support mission-critical initiatives such

as virtualization, application migration

or cloud computing, many enterprises

seek IT experts who can help evaluate and implement

solutions that address specific organizational needs.

Moreover, IT decision makers may prefer to engage

a local company that can act as a centralized source

for purchases and support, and that also understands

regional regulations and best practices.

To extend its commitment of providing best-in-class

IT solutions and services to organizations worldwide,

Dell has partnered with a growing number of value-

added resellers, global systems integrators and other

technology firms through the Dell PartnerDirect

program. Channel partners enrich Dell’s direct offerings

by providing value-added services, customization

and integration that can help businesses achieve

rapid, effective results. The Dell PartnerDirect channel

program has earned dozens of industry accolades,

including 2012 CRN Channel Champion honors1 and

a five-star Partner Program rating2 from CRN.

Choosing a channel partner

Organizations often engage Dell channel partners

for their breadth of experience that spans a variety

of vendors and technology. Many partners also have

depth of knowledge around a particular competency

or specific vertical markets.

Dell offers all partners access to free training

through live and virtual events, helping them expand

their expertise in the latest Dell solutions. Just last

year, Dell’s partners collectively completed over

200,000 technical and sales courses.

To help organizations identify a suitable partner,

the Dell PartnerDirect program features three levels

of partnership3 — Registered, Preferred and Premier —

that are based on experience, areas of competency

and depth of training.

Registered tier

Partners with the entry-level Registered status are

thoroughly vetted resellers of Dell products and

services and must have a valid Dell reseller certificate.

To support its valued Registered Partners, Dell

provides them with access to a range of resources

and programs, including the following:

• One-stop online ordering through the

Dell PartnerDirect portal

• Preconfigured, customer-ready solutions

• Pre- and post-sale customer care support

• Product information, collateral and more

through the Dell PartnerDirect portal

• Flexible financing programs for partners

and their customers

• Access to Dell Solution Centers (for more

information, see the sidebar, “Take a test drive”)

To leverage the latest tech innovations, many enterprises turn to Dell’s

value-added resellers around the globe. Supported by an award-winning

PartnerDirect program, Dell partners offer the expertise and experience

to deliver leading-edge solutions.

By James Wright and Heather Hernandez

Advancing business success through expert IT partners

Find a partner

The Partner Finder tool helps organizations locate companies enrolled in the Dell PartnerDirect program by location, partner status and area of expertise, which is also known as competencies.

Dell.com/findapartner

1 “Shining Stars: 2012 CRN Channel Champions Awards,” by CRN staff, CRN, qrs.ly/2f3oh5n.

2 “2012 Partner Program Guide,” CRN, qrs.ly/wz3oh5q.

3 For complete details, requirements and benefits of the Dell PartnerDirect program, please email Certified_PRD@dell.com.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Dell.com/powersolutions | 2013 Issue 04 73

Preferred tier

To become a Preferred Partner, organizations

must meet stringent competency, training

and revenue requirements. Specifically, a

Dell Preferred Partner must demonstrate

competency in one or more of nine

hardware and software areas: server, storage,

networking, desktop virtualization solutions,

cloud services and solutions, security, data

protection, systems management, and

information management. Additionally, a

Dell Preferred Partner must have at least

two sales and two technical individuals

on staff with demonstrated competencies,

and must meet or exceed a minimum

revenue threshold.

In addition to having access to the same

resources and programs as Registered

Partners, Preferred Partners have a dedicated

account team or channel account manager,

dedicated support resources, access to

exclusive training and more.

Premier tier

As a Premier Partner, an organization is

required to uphold the highest standards

of commitment and capabilities, including

revenue requirements and proven expertise

in Dell’s solutions portfolio. To be eligible

for Premier status, a Dell partner must

demonstrate superior knowledge — by a

minimum of four sales and four technical

experts — in two or more of the nine

hardware and software competencies.

Premier Partners enjoy priority access to

the Dell resources and programs available

to Registered and Preferred Partners. As an

additional resource for Dell’s most proficient

and knowledgeable partners, Premier Partners

also have access to the Dell Demo Center, a

self-service global demonstration platform.

With exceptional levels of support and

collaboration with Dell and demonstrated

technical expertise, Premier Partners are

positioned to deliver the highest levels of

quality and responsiveness to their customers.

Tapping into excellence and expertise

Enterprises now have access to more than

140,000 highly experienced Dell PartnerDirect

members operating throughout North

America, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Asia-

Pacific, Latin America and beyond. The Dell

PartnerDirect training, competency and

vetting process helps ensure that partners can

deliver expert guidance and ready access to

end-to-end Dell solutions to their enterprise

customers. Furthermore, Dell channel

partners have extensive industry experience,

often with additional accreditations from

vendors such as Microsoft and Intel. By

engaging Dell and its channel partners,

organizations are on their way to achieving

top-notch, successful deployments tailored

to their particular needs.

Authors

James Wright has been channel marketing director

for Dell’s EMEA region for the past 4 of his nearly

20 years as a channel veteran. Based out of

Dell’s Bracknell office in the United Kingdom,

his team manages the region’s partner and

channel marketing communications including

media, the PartnerDirect portal, social media

and partner events.

Heather Hernandez is a senior marketing

communications copywriter for global channel

marketing at Dell. She has served in various

writing, marketing and training roles at Dell

and other technology, ecommerce and

communications companies for over 15 years.

Learn more

Dell PartnerDirect:

partnerdirect.dell.com

Take a test driveAll Dell channel partners have access to Dell Solution Centers located in 14 sites

around the globe. Dell Solution Centers are living labs where partners can invite

their customers to explore, develop and test Dell solutions and technologies for

specific business requirements. Providing a deep technical hands-on experience,

the centers are equipped with the latest Dell enterprise and client hardware and

software offerings.

Alternatively, Dell partners can connect their customers to project

infrastructures remotely through a dedicated Dell Solution Center network —

allowing participants to leverage the expertise of the global Dell team regardless

of location. Dell Solution Centers also offer high-level executive strategy sessions

and training support.

Dell is a trademark of Dell Inc.

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

74 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Customer perspective

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

Oral Roberts University (ORU)

currently educates more than

3,100 students through its

Tulsa, Oklahoma, campus

and distance learning programs. To keep its

servers, storage and applications working

smoothly, ORU relies on Dell and EAGLE

Software, Inc., a Dell Premier Partner.

Recently, ORU initiated a multiyear plan to

implement virtual desktop infrastructure

(VDI) to help reduce total cost of ownership

for client computing while providing a

flexible computing experience for students,

faculty and staff.

“We had already experienced a lot

of success with virtualizing our server

environment, and EAGLE had been a

partner of ours helping us with that original

deployment,” says Ron Lee, IT systems

engineer at ORU. “We had a long-standing

relationship both for server hardware and

storage, along with their technical expertise

in implementing these systems.”

If not for its partnership with Dell and for

the Dell certifications it holds in the server

and storage tracks, EAGLE might not have

been awarded the VDI services business at

ORU, notes David Hiechel, president and

CEO, EAGLE Software, Inc. “Dell was also a

partner with Oral Roberts University and had

been in their data center for years,” he says.

“Dell understood that we had a great partner

relationship with ORU, knew that we had a

Oral Roberts University joins with Dell Premier Partner EAGLE Software, Inc.,

to implement a virtual desktop infrastructure that brings exceptional flexibility,

manageability and cost-efficiency to the school’s campus.

Oral Roberts University

Partnering for a first-rate virtual desktop infrastructure deployment

50140132-printerlogic.indd 1 11/14/13 7:58 PM

76 2013 Issue 04 | Dell.com/powersolutions

Customer perspective

Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted from Dell Power Solutions, 2013 Issue 4. Copyright © 2013 Dell Inc. All rights reserved.

good handle on their storage requirements,

and asked us to partner with them to help

ORU design, implement and maintain their

VDI deployment.”

EAGLE does a lot of listening when

designing IT solutions to solve its customers’

business problems, as was the case at ORU.

“One of the primary reasons we chose to go

with a VDI project for our computer labs had

to do with the refresh cycle for PCs,” says

Lee. “We would need to purchase new PCs

for the labs, and after three or four years,

they needed to be replaced.”

ORU was already using Dell EqualLogic

storage, so EAGLE recommended

deploying the VMware® View™ desktop

virtualization client on Dell PowerEdge

servers and Dell EqualLogic Internet

SCSI (iSCSI) storage arrays. To minimize

maintenance and other expenses, EAGLE

also recommended using Dell FX100 Zero

Clients in ORU computing labs.

Zeroing in on a virtual environment

“A zero client, which is the main client we

use on campus, is just a connection for

a monitor, mouse and keyboard, and a

network connection,” says Brian Jones,

manager of student IT services, ORU.

“When we contrasted maintaining

traditional PCs against the cost of

ownership advantages of using zero clients

in conjunction with virtual desktops, our

hardware desktop acquisition costs went

down considerably, as did our maintenance

costs and power consumption,” says Lee.

For example, in some tests of energy usage,

Jones determined that five zero clients

consumed the power of one computer.

By using VMware View linked clones,

along with solid-state disks in the Dell

EqualLogic PS6000XVS storage array,

ORU reduced its VDI storage requirements

more than tenfold while improving virtual

desktop performance. A linked clone is a

copy of a virtual machine (VM) that shares

virtual disks with the parent VM, conserving

disk space and allowing multiple VMs

to use the same software installation.

Explains Jones, “We can service 100

individuals and only use 60 gigabytes

on the initial master image and then 100

to 150 gigabytes for those 100 users, so

we’re only using 210 gigabytes versus

100 users at 25 gigabytes each.”

Furthermore, a malfunctioning zero

client can be replaced in minutes with an

off-the-shelf spare — no configuration required.

“We just replace the unit and they’re up and

running within five minutes, versus the one

to two days it would take us to replace and

rebuild a traditional PC,” says Jones.

Users can access their virtual desktops

remotely from any Internet-connected

device, with their computing sessions

securely following them around the

campus. Their data is also secure, because

it remains in the data center instead of on

local hard drives.

Reducing cost of ownership

through VDI efficiencies

The efficiencies of ORU’s VDI environment

bring a projected 50 percent cost of

ownership reduction for client computing

over the next eight years. “We found that

deploying the VMware View environment

for our computer labs was a natural

fit,” says Lee. “It was a perfect marriage

between the real storage efficiencies and

the performance efficiencies of the VM

environment and VDI environment.”

As evidenced by the success of the VDI

deployment at ORU, EAGLE Software has

seen significant repeat business with Dell

solutions. “Being a member of PartnerDirect

and a Premier Partner with Dell has really

opened a lot of doors for us as a value-

added reseller,” says Hiechel. “It’s been a

great relationship, and we really enjoy the

partnership that we have with Dell. It’s really

enabled us to do more than we were able

to do prior to becoming a Dell partner.”

Value of a strong partnershipOral Roberts University (ORU)

wanted to deploy virtual

desktop infrastructure to

reduce total cost of ownership

for client computing. By

working with EAGLE Software,

a Dell Premier Partner, the

university was able to reduce

energy and maintenance

costs while providing a flexible

computing experience for

students, faculty and staff.

50%ORU anticipates a 50 percent reduction in total cost of ownership for client computing over the next eight years, thanks to efficiencies obtained through Dell zero clients and Dell EqualLogic storage.

10xStorage requirements at ORU have been reduced more than tenfold by using VMware linked clones in conjunction with EqualLogic storage — while enhancing virtual desktop performance.

5 minutesIf a Dell zero client becomes inoperable, ORU IT staff can replace it and get it running within five minutes, a significant time savings compared to the one to two days required to replace and rebuild a traditional PC.

Dell, EqualLogic and PowerEdge are trademarks of Dell Inc.

Dell™ PowerEdge™ servers

Innovations to propel your business successDoing more with less is no longer just a buzz phrase. It’s a directive. And at the center of this all-important task is the focal point of your IT infrastructure: your servers. You need servers that can simplify your infrastructure and IT management. Transform mountains of data into mountains of insight - faster. And process complex workloads. You need the performance of Dell PowerEdge servers.

Dell PowerEdge servers, featuring Intel® Xeon® processors, offer:

• Maximum flexibility. Dell’s exclusive PowerEdge Select Network Adapter lets you seamlessly migrate between 1GbE and 10GbE interconnectionsdirectlyonthemotherboard,future-proofingyournetwork.

• Simplified management. iDRAC7, Dell’s agentless systems management tool, provides direct access to hardware status, inventoryandconfigurationeveniftheOSisdownornotinstalled.Yougetincreasedoversightwithfewerresources.

• Energy efficiency.EverycomponentinDellPowerEdgeserversisoptimizedforthemostefficientoperation,whichminimizes power consumption. In addition, 12th-generation Dell PowerEdge servers are powered by Intel Xeon processors, which Intel estimates can provide up to 80% more performance than previous generations.

DellPowerEdgeserverscanhelpyourcompanyprocessmoredata,supportmoreapplicationsandincreaseefficiencieswithouthurting your bottom line.

Please call Cheryl Claunch at 415-537-2444 for more information.

FusionStorm voted Partner of the Year 2012

Untitled-8 1 11/8/13 1:56 PM

Dell secure cloud solutions help doctors accelerate information- driven healthcare. With high-powered computing and storage solutions, Dell is helping doctors around the world share information and collaborate on life-saving treatments in weeks instead of months. To see how we can help solve your most important business challenges, visit Dell.com/domore

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