The needs of IT infrastructure continue to change due to emerging technology such as and more. These powerful applications can completely transform infrastructure in a short period of time, making it necessary for enterprises to have flexible solutions to keep up. While utilizing the public cloud can be a viable option, it may not help solve the needs of IT infrastructure. Read on to see how composable infrastructure can assist in simplifying management and increasing IT agility.

The Basics Of Composable Infrastructure

The main goal of composable infrastructure is to help enterprise data centers use their physical infrastructure to make deploying new applications a more efficient process. Ultimately, this means administrators don’t need to take the time to physically configure hardware for software application support. As formally explains: “In composable infrastructure, compute, storage, and networking resources are abstracted from their physical locations and can be managed by software through a web-based interface. Composable infrastructure makes data center resources as readily available as cloud services and is the foundation for private and hybrid cloud solutions.”

The Advantages Of Composable Infrastructure

There are numerous benefits to composable infrastructure. From business acceleration to simplicity, composable infrastructure can boost IT productivity and optimize assets. Flexibility and agility are also important benefits for modern enterprise data centers to quickly configure hardware and help prevent constrictions.

Composable systems increase flexibility by making it easier to scale individual resources. These systems also increase agility due to deploying workloads without the worry of what the underlying infrastructure needs to look like. Additionally, they can quickly align key business goals to drive organizations forward. Since the IT landscape is constantly increasing, it’s vital for IT teams to deploy infrastructure that keeps up with ever-changing technology and make it easier to integrate innovations as they are released.

HPE Composable Infrastructure

Many enterprises have chosen to migrate their IT infrastructure to . Their composable software-defined infrastructure service is ideal for hybrid cloud environments. It assists data centers in composing fluid pools of physical and virtual resources into any configuration for any workload. HPE Synergy deals with resources as a service that can be deployed to applications nearly in real-time, ultimately removing the need to configure hardware.

As stated above, the HPE composable infrastructure platform is composed of architectural elements such as storage, compute, management, and fabric resources that when brought together can bring many benefits to organizations. Let’s go over these four assets that are critical for composable infrastructure.

1. Composable Storage

HPE Synergy offers a high-powered, highly scalable storage system that supports file, block, and object-based storage systems. It also supports both internal and external storage components for your mission-critical applications.

2. Composable Compute

In this HPE system, compute modules deliver optimization in CPU and memory density, improved performance, scalability, simple storage, and configuration flexibility. All of these benefits enable a variety of workload support.

3. Composable Management

HPE Synergy offers two management elements that admins can use to manage workloads that are running in the environment. The first is HPE Synergy Composer. This allows you to deploy, monitor, and update infrastructure through its life cycle from one interface. The second element is HPE Synergy Image Streamer. This speeds up the deployment of a standard operating system through a straightforward and reliable process of the image payload.

4. Composable Fabric

This HPE composable infrastructure resource is extremely helpful for critical yet challenging fabric components. It supports rack-scale multifabric connectivity, eliminating the need for standalone switches. Overall, this improves performance, lowers costs, and simplifies life-cycle management. It’s very helpful in supporting storage workload needs.

Conclusion

Whether your business runs next-gen applications with dynamic supply demands or you work with traditional workloads, composable infrastructure will benefit your business. Composable infrastructure is not only an important opportunity for data center architects, but it helps organizations simplify IT infrastructure by building fluid resources that can support any workload with less cost and increased IT efficiency. If you’d like to accelerate your business or learn more about HPE composable infrastructure, contact our IT experts today.

Next Steps: In the meantime, view and download our free and informative checklist,

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Did you know that a recent IDG research study revealed 45 percent of IT decision makers do not understand the value of composable infrastructure? Even the most seasoned data center professionals are still growing familiar with what composable infrastructure is, how it came to be, and what its advantages are.

What Is Composable Infrastructure?

As it is explained in , “Composable infrastructure, sometimes referred to as “infrastructure as code” – is a software-defined solution that goes beyond simply converging or hyperconverging hardware, compute, and storage into a single integrated unit.” A composable system virtualizes the entire IT infrastructure: it treats physical compute, storage, and network devices as services, and manages all of IT via a single application. This eliminates the need to configure hardware to support specific applications and allows the infrastructure to be managed by software command. Composable infrastructures create pools of resources that are automatically composed in near real time to meet compute needs.” Dave Fafel, WEI’s Chief Architect, discusses composable infrastructure and HPE Synergy in this video.

Top 10 Business Advantages of Composable Infrastructure

Composable infrastructure represents one of the greatest steps forward for application delivery since DevOps. What are its benefits? We cover the top 10 business advantages of composable infrastructure below.

1. More Value/Less Cost

   
   

While it is still difficult to quantify the long-term costs and ROI, composable infrastructure provides value to business and development by providing increased efficiencies in infrastructure operations. It unlocks value by increasing productivity and control, and reduces CapEx by leveraging fluid pools of dynamic resources. That means paying for overprovisioning or stranded resources is a thing of the past. It also means lower OpEx through the reduction of disparate administration tools that can come with a steep learning curve.

2. Simplicity

   
   

A composable infrastructure environment provides less overall complexity by offering a single infrastructure model used across the enterprise, as opposed to many disparate and disconnected workflow-centric resources. This allows for a more open learning environment, less investment in staff training, and fewer silos of technical knowledge that often serve as barriers to change.

3. Efficiency

   
   

Composable infrastructure is unique in that it fully supports continuous IT service delivery. Workloads align with business demands and automation provides more efficient infrastructure management from top to bottom. This gain means fewer dollars spent on greater results.

4. Software Driven Tools for “Software Defined Everything”

   
   

Through the availability of a single, open RESTful API, developers can programmatically control composable infrastructure. With infrastructure resources being software-defined and abstracted from traditional hardware constraints, composable infrastructure can pool its compute, storage, and fabric resources. It then reassembles (or composes) these resources as needed, early on in the development process.

Via the single programmable interface, administrators and developers alike can manipulate any part of the environment using software defined templates.

According to Infrastructure for Dummies, “The unified API increases productivity and control across the data center by integrating and automating infrastructure operations and applications. It provides a single interface to discover, search, inventory, configure, provision, update, and diagnose the composable infrastructure. A single line of code fully describes and can provision the infrastructure required for an application, eliminating time”consuming scripting of hundreds of calls to low”level tools and interfaces.”

5. Agility

   
   

Composability also means agility. Thanks to resource disaggregation, composable infrastructure enables flexible, fluid, “frictionless” groundwork and the ability to ramp up or scale back at will. Working within a unified data center also eliminates siloed groups that impede operations, and can reduce CapEx and OpEx requirements, too.

6. Flexibility

   
   

Composable infrastructure is no longer limited to a single operating model and can run virtual machines, bare-metal, or within a containerized environment. With this flexibility, enterprises may go “all in” with composable or choose to adopt a more bimodal approach, utilizing existing legacy components and systems for rigid, predictable workloads alongside new composable delivery models focused on speed, growth, and innovative applications.

7. Business Acceleration

   
   

As applications have evolved from rigid release cycles to an as-needed delivery schedule, they are demanding more responsiveness from IT. Composable infrastructure reduces provisioning times through a template-driven approach, making infrastructure resources as on-demand as possible. This puts the infrastructure in position to no longer be a hindrance to business velocity, but a strategic asset.

As they say, “Be fast, or you will never last.” Composable infrastructure is the fastest operational model to date. With the increased speed and ease of provisioning of new infrastructure, composable data centers promise to achieve a delivery rate equivalent to that of the cloud, but from a secure data center. This can reduce overhead and increase the speed of important service delivery items, all while maintaining existing security and governance.

8. Modernization

   
   

Large scale technology shifts are directly resulting from the implementation of Agile and DevOps development methodologies. This modernization of technology on the front end requires back-end systems that are instantly adaptable and provisioned for any workload. Infrastructure resources must be more responsive than ever and assembled on demand, software defined, pooled, and composed to meet the requirements of modern application workloads. The result is the emerging “infrastructure as code” movement within the DevOps community, which is directly addressed by

As we explain in our white paper, , “According to IDC, companies must now adopt solutions to support a transition to infrastructures that deliver new capacity for next-generation applications while maintaining mission-critical IT workloads. The benefit of composable, says IDC, is that it aggregates compute, storage, and fabric into shared pools of resources that can be allocated on demand to orchestrate and deliver resources to meet service demands.”

9. Automatic Integration

   
   

With composable infrastructure, IT can plug in a new device, and much like plug and play on a PC, the component is instantly recognized and automatically added to the resource pool. With this, hardware and software requirements are architected and developed at the same time – to work in unison. Furthermore, provisioning can be done on the fly, as needed. No longer does one need to wait for the other.

10. Frictionless Operations

    
    

Without the constraints of traditional infrastructure, updates can now be executed automatically, without impacting IT operations. Such improvements include easy access to issue monitoring, hardware diagnosis, error reporting, firmware management, visualization, and control over resource pools. In addition, composable infrastructure works with any workload and is driven by the same virtualization tools managers have come to rely on. And it’s all done with the goal of being seamless/frictionless while providing more with less.

Conclusion

Composable infrastructure is a fresh new step in the journey to software-defined infrastructure that allows enterprises to scale quickly and easily to meet any challenge. And as we’ve seen, its benefits are many.

The promise of composable is clear, and WEI is here to ensure that you invest y our IT dollars in solutions that can consistently and reliably support all application and service delivery requests. Composable infrastructure brings companies one step closer to this promise by further closing the gap between development and operations teams.

Next Steps: Learn how composable paves the way for hybrid IT by downloading our white paper, “.”

The post 10 Composable Infrastructure Benefits appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

One of the biggest struggles with managing an enterprise data center is the need for various tools with multiple interfaces to manage the different systems associated with IT. This struggle is compounded with the fact that each of these data center systems do not talk to each out of the box, and complex integrations begin to take over. addresses this challenge by delivering an infrastructure that can manage the technical, as well as the organizational side by combining storage, compute, and network equipment into one.

What is Composable Infrastructure?

To put it simply, composable infrastructure treats computing, storage, and devices as resources that can be pooled together and used as needed. You are able to adjust the infrastructure depending on what workloads you require at the time so that you can optimize your IT performance and improve agility within the organization.

Network World compares this type of infrastructure to a public cloud, stating, “The approach is like a public cloud in that resource capacity is requested and provisioned from shared capacity – except composable infrastructure sits on-premises in an enterprise data center.”

Unlike other infrastructure systems, a composable infrastructure does not have pre-configured workloads. This freedom from pre-configured workloads allows your enterprise to reduce its under-utilization and over-provisioning, which in turn creates a more agile data center.

So how can benefit your enterprise? Keep reading for five ways that this composable infrastructure solution can help your organization.

5 Benefits of HPE Synergy for Your Enterprise

1. Run anything: With HPE Synergy you’re able to run resources at any time within a single pool. This allows you to instantly configure your system according to the specific needs of each application.
2. Software defined intelligence: Not only can you instantly configure the system to meet your needs, HPE’s composer uses integrated software-defined intelligence, which is able to accelerate operations using a single interface.
3. Pooling resources: HPE Synergy allows you to pool resources together with their operating system image using repeatable templates. This ability gives you the option to precisely compose and recompose infrastructures almost immediately. As explains, “When a template is launched, it configures the hardware programmatically, without human intervention, according to HPE, reducing the chance for errors and speeding up the process. The management software can also store OS images and apply them when a server is configured, automating that process as well.”
4. Scalability: Auto-integrating infrastructure makes scaling simple and automated. IT can easily assemble the building blocks your enterprise needs. Automatically update firmware, set BIOS settings and configure network connectivity.
5. Open integrations: HPE Synergy provides a fully programmable interface that allows your enterprise to take full advantage of potential vendor partnerships. With open-source automation and DevOps tools such as Chef, Docker, and OpenStack, you’re able to seamlessly integrate multiple management tools and future-proof your data center.

5 Questions To Ask Yourself About Composable Infrastructure

While composable infrastructure may seem like the answer to your data center needs, before you jump in head first you need to be aware that a successful move to composable infrastructure won’t happen without careful planning and a team that has the skills needed to take on such a project. To help you know if you’re ready to deploy composable infrastructure in your organization, here are five questions you need to ask:

1. What are your operational and financial goals?
2. What problem are you trying to solve: single and discrete or a systemic?
3. How quickly do you need to deploy your applications?
4. Does average server over-provisioning amount to more than 85 percent?
5. What are your organization’s requirements for data security?

Do you need help answering these questions? Contact WEI to kick off a discussion. We have experience implementing HPE Synergy and have several assessments to help you make the right decisions along your data center modernization journey.

Next Steps: Learn how to drive data center modernization with composable infrastructure by downloading our .

The post 5 Benefits of HPE Synergy [Composable Infrastructure] appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Hyperconverged combines compute and storage resources into a single workload-optimized appliance and added a software layer to the data center. takes it to the next level by disaggregating hardware so it can be provisioned for any workload at any time and then reprovisioned for future needs; and amplifies the software-defined flexibility, agility, stability, automation, efficiency and speed you’ve grown accustomed to. Plus many (many) more benefits.

Composable infrastructure begins here

The promise of composable is easy to see, however taking the next leap in data center modernization isn’t. A move to composable also doesn’t happen (successfully) without careful planning and a team. Before we look at benefits, consider these types of questions:

1. What are your operational and financial goals?
2. What problems are you trying to solve, a single and discrete or a systemic?
3. How quickly do you need to deploy your applications?
4. Does average server overprovisioning amount to more than 85%?
5. What is your organization’s requirements for data security?

Benefits of composable infrastructure

The of composable infrastructure are many and varied, but in short it has the ability to drive innovation, reduce costs, speed time to deploy applications, and ensure business demands can be met in real time. Here are a few more advantages:

• Continuous, streamlined IT delivery
• Updates are made without interrupting regular IT operations
• DevOps can automate applications and accelerate application development
• Infrastructure applications can be replenished in a matter of minutes
• Infrastructure flexibility – The network is dynamically configured, allowing more flexibility
• Single platform – The hybrid environment reduces overhead and increases overall efficiency
• Reduces operational effort – It offers polished operations enabled through software-specific modalities
• Automation for a more simplified system – allows a future-proof data center ready to scale
• Application speed – Automation is used for hardware configuration to service the applications that demand it
• Improved governance – Governance is set by the organization which ensures it’s aligned with and supports business goals

Composable combines compute, storage, and network into centralized compartments. It efficiently delivers resources, meets the demands of your business and saves time for your IT department. It’s not always easy or worth it to be an early adopter, but when it makes sense the payoff can be huge especially when the prize is cost reduction, efficiency, faster time to market, and marketplace differentiators…

These are just a handful of advantages that come with composable. Check out what HPE is currently doing in this new technology with its . WEI’s Chief Architect, Dave Fafel, talks about why this solution is needed for data center modernization, talks about the 5 components of the HPE Synergy platform, and he tells you what you really need to know about this new technology.

Ask WEI for a demo of HPE Synergy to better understand how this new solution can benefit your IT organization.

The post A look at Composable Infrastructure and HPE Synergy appeared first on IT Solutions Provider - IT Consulting - Technology Solutions.

Hyperconverged combined compute and storage resources into a single workload-optimized appliance and added a software layer to the data center. takes it to the next level by disaggregating hardware so it can be provisioned for any workload at any time and then reprovisioned for future needs; and amplifies the software-defined flexibility, agility, stability, automation, efficiency and speed you’ve grown accustomed to. Plus many (many) more benefits.

Composable infrastructure begins here

The promise of composable is easy to see, however taking the next leap in data center modernization isn’t. A move to composable also doesn’t happen (successfully) without careful planning and a team. Before we look at benefits, consider these types of questions:

1. What are your operational and financial goals?
2. What problems are you trying to solve, a single and discrete or a systemic?
3. How quickly do you need to deploy your applications?
4. Does average server overprovisioning amount to more than 85%?
5. What is your organization’s requirements for data security?

Benefits of composable infrastructure

The of composable infrastructure are many and varied, but in short it has the ability to drive innovation, reduce costs, speed time to deploy applications, and ensure business demands can be met in real time. Here are a few more advantages:

• Continuous, streamlined IT delivery
• Updates are made without interrupting regular IT operations
• DevOps can automate applications and accelerate application development
• Infrastructure applications can be replenished in a matter of minutes
• Infrastructure flexibility – The network is dynamically configured, allowing more flexibility
• Single platform – The hybrid environment reduces overhead and increases overall efficiency
• Reduces operational effort – It offers polished operations enabled through software-specific modalities
• Automation for a more simplified system – allows a future-proof data center ready to scale
• Application speed – Automation is used for hardware configuration to service the applications that demand it
• Improved governance – Governance is set by the organization which ensures it’s aligned with and supports business goals

Composable combines compute, storage, and network into centralized departments. It efficiently delivers resources, meets the demands of your business and saves time for your IT department. It’s not always easy or worth it to be an early adopter, but when it makes sense the payoff can be huge especially when the prize is cost reduction, efficiency, faster time to market, and marketplace differentiators…

These are just a handful of advantages that come with composable. Check out what HPE is currently doing in this new technology with its . For a deeper dive into the details of what composable can do for your data center and a step-by-step of what to look for when weighing options, follow the link below to our white paper.

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