What are Hyper-Converged Infrastructure Solutions?

Introduction

Hyper-convergence is an IT methodology that combines computing, networking, and storage into a single platform to increase scalability and minimize data center complexity. Hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) solutions include virtualized networking, software-defined storage, and a hypervisor for virtual computing, and they run on standard servers. They cluster multiple nodes to produce pools of shared storage and computing resources, built for convenient usage.

HCI solutions use commodity hardware, managed by one vendor, to create a more flexible infrastructure that is easier to support compared to conventional enterprise storage infrastructure. Thus, hyper-convergence is an ideal option for IT managers who are modernizing their data centers as it gives them the agility of public cloud setup combined with the greater hardware control of on-premise hosting.

Features of Hyper-Converged Infrastructure Solutions

Data Center Consolidation

With HCI, organizations can replace monolithic networking and storage environments with consolidated infrastructure resources to boost the capabilities of their data centers. Data center consolidation involves automating software to centralize management, which simplifies the network architecture and makes the IT manager’s jobs simpler. In addition, you can effectively scale the infrastructure and enhance system capacity by increasing the number of nodes in the existing HCI platform without needing to apply configuration, management, and security protocols individually for each hardware device.

Software-Centric Architecture

HCI operations are software-defined, which means policies that administer workload processes are not linked to particular infrastructure hardware parts. Therefore, these policies are not reconfigured when fresh hardware is added or when the workload shifts between instances of data center storage. Because of the software-centric design, policies are labeled and sustained at the abstracted level of a combined infrastructure, instead of being linked with individual hardware items. Another benefit of the software-centric design is organizations can utilize automation features to protect, scale, and manage the infrastructure to meet changing workload requirements.

Virtualization Transcending Network Boundaries

HCI eliminates the barriers imposed by conventional virtualization frameworks. The integrated network, storage, and compute systems function as modular parts that can be included for infrastructure scale-out. Unlike converged infrastructure in which storage is linked to hardware parts, HCI distributes the storage controller feature among the infrastructure nodes in the form of a software service. The framework of software-defined storage organizes the entire resource pool available in a virtualized environment. This simplifies the storage management function and it can be applied to the whole infrastructure as an automated software-powered process.

Centralized Management

HCI provides a unified and single management plane for infrastructure platforms running a distributed data plan, and with container-based apps or Virtual Machines operating networking, storage, and compute across a group of nodes. For this reason, organizations don’t need separate management consoles for different virtualized resources or hardware which is the case with conventional standard or converged virtualized infrastructure setups. The nodes continue to function as individual federated platforms, while the data and infrastructure management processes are standardized across the collected resources and managed with a single, merged user interface.

Benefits of Hyper-Converged Infrastructure Solutions

Improved IT Agility

In today’s IT environment, IT managers need to enhance data agility and manage the fast pace of changes. IT environments in organizations face the challenges of complex tasks, multiplying projects, and shrinking timelines. Hyper-convergence is an ideal technology to meet these challenges positively.

HCI solutions provide the agility to create virtualized platforms to support fresh workloads, and the flexibility to move, grow, and reduce workloads as required. In the HCI setup, all your resources such as networking, disk, memory, and CPU reside under one administrative umbrella. This makes workload migration and new server creation a breeze, particularly with a system that facilitates consistent deduplication. The advantages are your IT unit will be able to deliver more quickly and you will find it simpler to work with less data.

Enhanced Efficiency and Scalability

HCI solutions use a building-block method which allows you to easily expand by including modular hardware solutions. This makes deployment fast and and simple, and virtual machines can start functioning within 15 minutes. Plus, the HCI environment allows you to retire units from a group and add new ones, facilitating seamless continuous upgrades. The building-block method enables you to use resources efficiently and reduces up-front expenses.

Reduces Cost of Ownership in the Long Run

There is no denying that HCI solutions have added upfront software and hardware costs, but over the long term, the costs of customization, administration, and management are much lower compared to conventional IT systems.

Effortless Automation

Automation is an important aspect of software defined data center (SDDC) and gels well with the paradigms of hyper-convergence. HCI systems combine all resources and encapsulate them in a single, neat environment from where they can be run with centralized management tools. As a result, HCI platforms facilitate effortless automation of regular systems administration and management.