Providing Out-of-Band Connectivity to Mission-Critical IT Resources

Out-of-Band Monitoring: What it is and Why You Need It

Out-of-band monitoring what it is and why you need it

Network reliability and security are mission-critical for organizations. Yet, relying solely on in-band networks for monitoring and management creates a significant risk. When the primary network experiences an outage or breach, IT teams need to scramble to regain control. Out-of-band monitoring offers a dedicated pathway for monitoring and managing devices, so teams have reliable, always-available access to ensure resilience. But, how does out-of-band monitoring work? What can it monitor? Why is it essential to a network resilience strategy? Let’s find out.

What is Out-of-Band Monitoring and How Does it Work?

Out-of-band monitoring is a network management strategy that uses a dedicated management network, separate from the production network, to monitor and manage critical infrastructure. Whereas in-band monitoring relies on the same data network used by users and applications, out-of-band monitoring remains isolated and operational even if the main network is down.

How does out-of-band monitoring connect to devices?

  • Console Access via Serial Ports: Out-of-band monitoring uses serial console ports on routers, switches, firewalls, and servers to provide direct access to the device’s command-line interface (CLI). This connection bypasses the primary network entirely.
  • Dedicated Management Interfaces: Many modern devices come with a dedicated management Ethernet port (e.g., Cisco’s management interface or HP iLO for servers). These ports are linked to an out-of-band network, allowing secure remote access.
  • Secure Remote Access Gateways: Centralized console servers or remote access gateways aggregate connections to multiple devices, making it easy to manage a large number of endpoints from a single interface.

Teams can gain remote access to out-of-band console servers via dedicated cellular, ISP, Starlink, or other connection that is separate from the main network.

Network diagram showing how out-of-band management works

Image: An out-of-band network provides dedicated connectivity that’s separate from the main network. NOC admins can gain access to out-of-band console servers via cellular, dial-up, ISP, or other connection, and manage all data center/branch devices connected to the console servers.

What can out-of-band monitor and manage?

  • Network Device Status: Real-time monitoring of routers, switches, and firewalls for availability, performance, and errors.
  • Power Systems: Monitoring and managing power distribution units (PDUs) to ensure stable power, perform remote power cycling, and maintain updated firmware.
  • Server Health: Tracking CPU, memory, disk usage, and hardware diagnostics for servers through out-of-band management interfaces like IPMI, Dell iDRAC, or HP iLO.
  • Environmental Conditions: Temperature, humidity, and physical security sensors can be monitored to detect and respond to environmental threats in data centers and remote sites.
  • Network Connectivity: Ensures WAN links, including primary and backup connections (cellular or satellite), are functioning properly.

How Out-of-Band Monitoring Improves Resilience

Out-of-band monitoring significantly enhances network resilience by providing independent access to critical infrastructure. With transparency into device health, network performance, and other systems, teams can stem issues before they have a chance to develop into outages or security breaches. If any problems do occur on the main network, this out-of-band lifeline lets teams instantly respond rather than forcing them to dispatch on-site technicians.

  1. Always-On Access
    Out-of-band networks operate independently from production traffic, ensuring that administrators can maintain visibility and control even when the primary network is congested or down.
  2. Incident Recovery and Diagnostics
    When the primary network is compromised, out-of-band allows IT teams to perform root cause analysis, reconfigure devices, and restore services without relying on affected in-band connectivity.
    • Example: During a DDoS attack, out-of-band provides a clean path to troubleshoot and block the attack at the firewall.
    • Example: If a firmware update causes a network device to become unresponsive, the out-of-band console allows administrators to roll back changes or restore from backup.
  3. Secure and Segmented Access
    Out-of-band isolates management traffic from business data, reducing the attack surface and preventing lateral movement by attackers. Combined with multi-factor authentication (MFA), access control lists (ACLs), and encrypted tunnels, out-of-band becomes a secure channel for managing sensitive infrastructure.
  4. Proactive Monitoring and Automation
    Advanced OOB solutions enable proactive monitoring of device health and predictive failure analysis. Integrated automation tools can trigger alerts, backups, or failover mechanisms when certain thresholds are reached.

Secure Out-of-Band Monitoring with ZPE Systems’ Nodegrid Platform

When implementing out-of-band monitoring, ZPE Systems’ Nodegrid platform offers a secure, vendor-agnostic solution designed for modern IT environments.

Why Nodegrid Stands Out:

  • Universal Compatibility: Nodegrid supports a wide range of network devices and servers, integrating with Cisco, Juniper, Dell, Palo Alto Networks, and more.
  • Consolidated Devices: Nodegrid is a multi-function, drop-in solution that replaces six or more traditional management devices, including servers, routers, switches, cellular, and others.
  • Built-In Cellular and Starlink Failover: Ensure remote sites stay connected through cellular 4G/5G or satellite (Starlink) connections when traditional WAN links fail.
  • Centralized Management: Nodegrid provides a unified management interface that enables IT teams to monitor, manage, and automate infrastructure from a single dashboard.
  • Security First: Nodegrid and ZPE Cloud are the industry’s most secure platform, with features like role-based access control (RBAC), network segmentation, and encrypted communications to safeguard management traffic.

Nodegrid Data Lake interface visualizing data points using graphs and meters.

Image: ZPE Cloud enables data collection and analyses for out-of-band monitoring, allowing users to monitor infrastructure metrics, visualize trends, and take a proactive approach to maintaining uptime.

Out-of-band monitoring is essential for any organization prioritizing uptime and security. The Nodegrid platform by ZPE Systems offers secure, scalable solutions like the 96-port Nodegrid Serial Console Plus for hyperscale data centers and the Nodegrid Gate SR for remote sites. With support for automation, APIs, and custom alerts, Nodegrid simplifies out-of-band monitoring for complex networks while ensuring continuous control, even during outages.

Explore Nodegrid for Drop-In Out-of-Band Monitoring

See why Nodegrid is the drop-in out-of-band monitoring solution trusted by hyperscalers, telecom, retail, and hundreds of global organizations. Request a demo today.

The Future of Data Centers: Overcoming the Challenges of Lights-Out Operations

Future of lights-out data centers

In a recent article, Y Combinator announced its search for startups aiming to eliminate human intervention in data center development and operation. While one half of this vision seems focused on automating the design and construction of data centers, the other half – focused on fully automating operations (a.k.a. “lights-out”) – is already a reality. ZPE Systems and Legrand are enabling enterprises to achieve this kind of operation by providing the best practices that are already in use in hyperscale data centers for lights-out management.

The Need for Lights-Out Data Centers

The growth of cloud computing, edge deployments, and AI-driven workloads means data centers need to be as efficient, scalable, and resilient as possible. The challenge is that because there is so much infrastructure to manage, the buildout and operation of these data centers becomes very costly and time consuming.

Diane Hu, a YC group partner who previously worked in augmented reality and data science, says, “Hyperscale data center projects take many years to complete. We need more data centers that are created faster and cheaper to build out the infrastructure needed for AI progress. Whether it be in power infrastructure, cooling, procurement of all materials, or project management.”

Dalton Caldwell, a YC managing director who also cofounded App.net, adds, “Software is going to handle all aspects of planning and building a new data center or warehouse. This can include site selection, construction, set up, and ongoing management. They’re going to be what’s called lights-out. There’s going to be robots, autonomously operating 24/7. We want to fund startups to help create this vision.”

In terms of ongoing management and operations, bringing this vision to life will require organizations to overcome several significant problems:

  1. Rising Operational Costs: Staffing and maintaining on-site engineers 24/7 is costly. Labor expenses, training, and turnover increase operational overhead.
  2. Human Error and Downtime: Human error is the leading cause of downtime, so having manual processes often leads to costly outages caused by typos, misconfigurations, and slow response times.
  3. Security Threats: Physical access to data centers increases the risk of insider threats, breaches, and unauthorized interventions.
  4. Remote Site Management: Managing geographically distributed data centers and edge locations requires staff to be on-site. What’s needed is a scalable and efficient solution that lets staff remotely perform every job, outside of physically installing equipment.
  5. Sustainability and Energy Efficiency: On-site workers have specific heating/cooling needs that must be met in order to comfortably perform their jobs. Reducing human presence in data centers enables better energy management, which can lower carbon footprints and reduce cooling requirements.

The Roadblocks to Lights-Out Data Centers

Despite the obvious benefits, organizations struggle to implement fully autonomous data center operations. The obstacles include:

  • Legacy Infrastructure: Many enterprises still rely on outdated equipment that lacks the necessary integrations for automation and remote control. Adding functions or capabilities typically means deploying more physical boxes, which increases costs and complexity.
  • Network Resilience and Connectivity: Traditional in-band network management fails during outages, making it difficult to troubleshoot and recover remotely. Without complete separation of the management network from production networks, organizations are unable to achieve true resilience from errors, outages, and breaches.
  • Integration Challenges: Implementing AI-driven automation, OOB management, and cybersecurity protections requires seamless interoperability between different vendors’ solutions.
  • Security Concerns: A fully automated data center must have robust access controls, zero-trust security frameworks, and remote threat mitigation capabilities.
  • Skill Gaps: The shift to automation necessitates retraining IT staff, who may be unfamiliar with the latest technologies required to maintain a hands-off data center.

Direct remote access is risky

Image: The traditional management approach relies on production assets. This makes it impossible to achieve resilience, because production failures cut off remote admin access.

How ZPE Systems is Powering Lights-Out Operations

ZPE Systems is already helping companies overcome these challenges and transition to lights-out data center operations. As part of Legrand, ZPE is a key component in a total solution offering that includes everything from cabinets and containment to power distribution and remote access. By leveraging out-of-band management, intelligent automation, and zero-trust security, ZPE enables enterprises to manage their infrastructure remotely and securely.

Isolated Management Infrastructure is critical to lights-out data center operations.

Image: ZPE Systems’ Nodegrid creates an Isolated Management Infrastructure. This gives admins secure remote access, even when the production network fails or suffers an attack.

Key benefits of this management infrastructure include:

  • Reliable Remote Access: ZPE’s OOB solutions ensure secure access to critical infrastructure even when primary networks fail. This is made possible by ZPE’s Isolated Management Infrastructure (IMI), which creates a fully separate management network. This single-box solution helps organizations achieve lights-out operations without device sprawl.
  • Automated Remediation: ZPE’s platform hosts third party applications, Docker containers, and AI and automation solutions. Organizations can leverage data about device health, telemetry, environmentals, and in-band performance, to resolve issues fast and prevent downtime.
  • Hardened Security: ZPE’s solutions are built with security in mind, from local MFA, to self-encrypted disk and signed OS. ZPE also has the most security certifications and validations, including SOC2 Type 2, FIPS 140-3, and ISO27001. Read our full supply chain security assurance pdf.
  • Multi-Vendor Integration: ZPE is the only drop-in solution that works across diverse environments, regardless of which vendor solutions are already in place. This makes it easy to deploy IMI and the resilience architecture necessary for achieving lights-out operations.
  • Comprehensive Data Center Solutions: With Legrand’s full suite of data center infrastructure, organizations benefit from a fully integrated approach that ensures efficiency, scalability, and resilience.

Lights-out data centers are an achievable reality. By addressing the key challenges and leveraging advanced remote management solutions, enterprises can reduce operational costs, enhance security, and improve efficiency. As part of Legrand, ZPE Systems continues to lead the charge in enabling this transformation for organizations across the globe.

See How Vapor IO Achieved Lights-Out Operations with ZPE Systems

Vapor IO is re-architecting the internet. They deploy micro data centers at the network edge, serving markets across the U.S. and Europe. When they needed to achieve true lights-out operations, they chose ZPE Systems’ Nodegrid. Find out how this solution reduced deployment times to just one hour and delivered additional time and cost savings. Download the full case study below.

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Why Out-of-Band Management Is Critical to AI Infrastructure

Out-of-Band Management for AI

Artificial intelligence is transforming every corner of industry. Machine learning algorithms are optimizing global logistics, while generative AI tools like ChatGPT are reshaping everyday work and communications. Organizations are rapidly adopting AI, with the global AI market expected to reach $826 billion by 2030, according to Statista. While this growth is reshaping operations and outcomes for organizations in every industry, it brings significant challenges for managing the infrastructure that supports AI workloads.

The Rapid Growth of AI Adoption

AI is no longer a technology that lives only in science fiction. It’s real, and it has quickly become crucial to business strategy and the overall direction of many industries. Gartner reports that 70% of enterprise executives are actively exploring generative AI for their organizations, and McKinsey highlights that 72% of companies have already adopted AI in at least one business function.

It’s easy to understand why organizations are rapidly adopting AI. Here are a few examples of how AI is transforming industries:

  • Healthcare: AI-driven diagnostic tools have improved disease detection rates by up to 30x, while drug discovery timelines are being slashed from years to months.
  • Retail: E-commerce platforms use AI to power personalized recommendations, leading to a revenue increase of 5-25%.
  • Manufacturing: AI in predictive maintenance can help increase productivity by 25%, lower maintenance costs by 25%, and reduce machine downtime by 70%.

AI is a powerful tool that can bring profound outcomes wherever it’s used. But it requires a sophisticated infrastructure of power distribution, cooling systems, computing, GPUs, servers, and networking gear, and the challenge lies in managing this infrastructure.

Infrastructure Challenges Unique to AI

AI environments are complex, with workloads that are both resource-intensive and latency-sensitive. This means organizations face several challenges that are unique to AI:

 

  1. Skyrocketing Energy Demands: AI racks consume between 40kW and 200kW of power, which is 10x more than traditional IT equipment. Energy efficiency in the AI data center is a top priority, especially as data centers account for 1% of global electricity consumption.
  2. Cost of Downtime: AI systems are especially vulnerable to interruptions, which can cause a ripple effect and lead to high costs. A single server failure can disrupt entire model training processes, costing enterprises $9,000 per minute in downtime, as estimated by Uptime Institute.
  3. Cybersecurity Risks: AI processes sensitive data, making AI data centers prime targets for attack. Sophos reports that in 2024, 59% of organizations suffered a ransomware attack, and the average cost to recover (excluding ransom payment) was $2.73 million.
  4. Operational Complexity: AI environments rely on a diverse set of hardware and software systems. Monitoring and managing these components effectively requires real-time visibility into thermal conditions, humidity, particulates, and other environmental and device-related factors.

The Role of Out-of-Band Management in AI

Out-of-band (OOB) management is a must-have for organizations scaling their AI capabilities. Unlike traditional in-band systems that rely on the production network, OOB operates independently to give teams uninterrupted access and control. They can remotely perform monitoring and maintenance tasks to AI infrastructure, troubleshooting, and complete system recovery even if the production network goes offline.

 

How OOB Management Solves Key Challenges:

  • Minimized Downtime: With OOB, IT teams can drastically reduce downtime by troubleshooting issues remotely rather than dispatching teams on-site.
  • Energy Efficiency: Real-time monitoring and optimization of power distribution enable organizations to eliminate zombie servers and other inefficiencies.
  • Enhanced Security: OOB systems isolate management traffic from production networks per CISA’s best practice recommendations, which reduces the attack surface and mitigates cybersecurity risks.
  • Operational Efficiency: Remote monitoring via OOB offers a complete view of environmental conditions and device health, so teams can operate proactively and prevent issues before failures happen.

Use Cases: Out-of-Band Management for AI

There’s no shortage of use cases for AI, but organizations often overlook implementing out-of-band in their environment. Aside from using OOB in AI data centers, here are some real-world use cases of out-of-band management for AI.

1. Autonomous Vehicle R&D

Developers of self-driving technology find it difficult to manage their high-density AI clusters, especially because outages delay testing and development. By implementing OOB management, these developers can reduce recovery times from hours to minutes and shorten development timelines.

2. Financial Services Firms

Banks deploy AI to detect and combat fraud, but these power-hungry systems often lead to inefficient energy usage in the data center. With OOB management, they can gain transparency into GPU and CPU utilization. Not only can they eliminate energy waste, but they can optimize resources to improve model processing speeds.

3. University AI Labs

Universities run AI research on supercomputers, but this strains the underlying infrastructure with high temperatures that can cause failures. OOB management can provide real-time visibility into air temperature, device fan speed, and cooling systems to prevent infrastructure failures.

Download Our Guide, Solving AI Infrastructure Challenges with Out-of-Band Management

Out-of-band management is the key to having reliable, high-performing AI infrastructure. But what does it look like? What devices does it work with? How do you implement it?

Download our whitepaper Solving AI Infrastructure Challenges with Out-of-Band Management for answers. You’ll also get Nvidia’s SuperPOD reference design along with a list of devices that integrate with out-of-band. Click the button for your instant download.

Optimizing Remote Management & AI Infrastructure Automation

Webinars & Presentations

Sammi Pfeil and Fady Khalil present the best practices for remote management and AI infrastructure. Watch this 15-minute video to see the best practices architecture that helps you remotely access, troubleshoot, and optimize devices in your data center, including components that support your AI environments.

Get the whitepaper Solving AI Infrastructure Challenges with Out-of-Band Management

Download our guide to out-of-band management and IMI

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Lantronix G520: Alternative Options

The G520 is a series of cellular gateways from Lantronix designed for industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), security, and transport use cases. While it provides redundant networking capabilities, it lacks critical resilience features such as out-of-band management (OOBM). This guide explains where the G520 falls short and why it matters before describing alternative options that deliver multi-functional IIoT capabilities and network resilience.

Why consider Lantronix G520 alternatives?

The Lantronix G520 is a cellular gateway that provides network connectivity, failover, and load balancing for IoT devices. However, it lacks serial console management capabilities, which means you need a separate device for remote management and OOBM. Out-of-band management is a crucial technology that separates the network control plane from the data plane to prevent breaches of management interfaces. OOBM also improves resilience by using a dedicated network (like cellular LTE) that gives remote teams a lifeline to recover from equipment failures, network outages, and breaches.

Percepxion G520

G520 gateways are managed with the Percepxion cloud platform, while cellular data plans and VPN security are managed separately with the cloud-based Connectivity Services software. These software solutions cannot be extended with third-party integrations, so teams must manage two separate Lantronix platforms and use separate software for monitoring, security, etc. Closed software also prevents teams from utilizing third-party automation and orchestration and creates a lot of management complexity, increasing the risk of human error and reducing operational efficiency.

G520 hardware also lacks extensibility due to an ARM architecture and tiny 256MB Flash storage. This essentially makes it a single-purpose device, with organizations needing to deploy additional appliances to run edge workloads, security applications, and other third-party software. There’s another IIoT gateway solution that combines edge networking capabilities with OOBM, the ability to run or integrate third-party applications, and a unified, extensible cloud management platform that extends automation and orchestration to all the devices in your deployment.

Nodegrid alternatives for the G520

Nodegrid is a line of vendor-neutral, edge networking solutions from ZPE Systems. The closest alternative to the Lantronix G520 is the Nodegrid Mini Services Router (or Mini SR)

Nodegrid Mini SR vs. Lantronix G520

 

Nodegrid Mini SR

Lantronix G520

CPU

x86-64bit Intel Processor

600 MHz ARM-based CPU 

Guest OS

1

0

Docker Apps

1-2

0

Storage

16GB SED

256MB Flash

Wi-Fi

Yes

Yes

Cloud Management

ZPE Cloud

Lantronix Percepxion, Connectivity Services

Cellular 

Dual-SIM

Dual-SIM

Serial

Via USB

No

Network

2 x 1Gb ETH

1 x 10/100 ETH

The Mini SR is a compact, fanless edge gateway small enough to be easily installed in any industrial environment. In addition to gateway, networking, and failover capabilities, the Mini SR provides OOBM for all connected devices, turning it into an IoT device management solution. Nodegrid’s OOBM completely isolates IoT management interfaces and ensures they’re remotely available 24/7 even during ISP outages and ransomware infections.

Mini-SR-Rear

The Mini SR and all connected devices are managed with ZPE Cloud, an intuitive platform that’s easily extensible with third-party integrations for infrastructure automation, edge security, SCADA software, and much more. The best part is that ZPE Cloud is a unified solution that gives administrators a single-pane-of-glass management experience for convenience and efficiency. 

Mini-SR-Diagram-980×748

The Mini SR and all other Nodegrid hardware solutions run on the vendor-neutral, Linux-based Nodegrid OS and come with robust Intel architectures. As a result, they can host Guest OS and even Docker containers for third-party applications, reducing the need for additional hardware appliances in cramped industrial environments. The Mini SR is an all-in-one solution that reduces edge expenses and complexity while improving resilience and operational efficiency.

Other Nodegrid alternatives for the Lantronix G520

Depending on your use case, you may have other reasons to consider G520 alternatives, such as the need for a complete serial console management solution, or the desire to run artificial intelligence (AI) workflows at the edge without deploying expensive single-purpose GPUs. Luckily, the Nodegrid line has solutions for every edge use case and pain point.

Comparing Nodegrid SRs

Nodegrid Mini SR Nodegrid Gate SR Nodegrid Hive SR Nodegrid Link SR Nodegrid Bold SR Nodegrid Net SR
Potential Use Cases Edge IoT, IIoT, OT, and IoMD (Internet of Medical Devices) deployments Branch service delivery and AI Distributed branch and edge sites like manufacturing plants Branch, IoT, and M2M (Machine-to-Machine) deployments Branch and edge deployments like telecom, retail, and oil & gas Large branches, edge data centers
CPU x86-64bit Intel Processor x86-64bit Intel Processor x86-64bit Intel Processor x86-64bit Intel Processor x86-64bit Intel Processor x86-64bit Intel Processor
Guest OS 1 1-3 1-2 1 1 1-6
Docker Apps 1-2 1-4 1-3 1-2 1-2 1-4
Storage 16GB SED 32GB – 128GB 16GB – 128GB 16GB – 128GB 32GB – 128GB 32GB – 128GB
Secondary Additional Storage Up to 4TB Up to 4TB Up to 4TB Up to 4TB Up to 4TB
PoE+ Output Yes Yes
Wi-Fi Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
ZPE Cloud Support Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Cellular (Dual-SIM) 1 1-2 1-2 1 1-2 1-4
Serial Via USB 8 8 1 8 16-80
Network 2 x 1Gb ETH 2 x SFP+, 5 x Gb ETH, 4 x 1Gb ETH PoE+ 2x GbE ETH, 2x 10 Gbps, 4x 10/100/1000/2.5 Gbps RJ-45 1 x Gb ETH 1 x SFP 5 x Gb ETH 2 1Gb ETH, 2 SFP+, Multiple Cards
GPIO 2 DIO, 1 OUT, 1 Relay 2 DIO, 2 OUT
Power Single Single or Redundant Single Single Single Single or Redundant
Data Sheet Download Download Download Download Download Download

Get a complete IIoT solution with Nodegrid

The Nodegrid Mini SR improves upon the Lantronix G520 by consolidating edge networking capabilities and offering a vendor-neutral platform to host and integrate all your third-party applications. Schedule a demo to see Nodegrid in action!