Many of these devices and tools are outdated, sit in silos, and were never designed for the complexities of today’s smart infrastructures.

We now have more advanced solutions that can be applied to legacy systems as well as new data flows using edge computing, cloud computing, machine learning, and AI to provide new capabilities, reduce complexities, and further drive operational efficiencies.

1. Ease of Deployment

Is your EDGE solution simple to deploy? Can your Smart Hands get the job done? Will they be able to keep the devices up to date at each location without issue? Is Zero Touch Provisioning via WAN (IPv4 and IPv6) supported? There’s nothing more satisfying than plugging in a device, and having everything just work.

2. Safety / Keeping your Data Center Safe

EDGE devices can potentially serve as a backdoor into your data center… What happens if someone uses the EDGE device to connect back to your data center and gain unauthorized access to the network? Does your solution have the proper security features in place to ensure that not only do the proper people have access, but also validate that the access is coming from an authorized location?

3. Centralized Remote Management

Can your EDGE devices be supported by an SDN, remote management or Out-of-Band solution? Does it allow you to manage all devices locally, and at each of your EDGE branches/locations? Does the solution give you a 360° view of the entire network infrastructure without the need and complexity of a high-level management platform?

4. Notifications and Actionable Data

Because it’s very costly to have IT support staff present in every one of your locations (local and remote), you need a solution that provides data logging, notification, and automation capabilities to help reduce, or eliminate, the need for onsite IT staff, or expensive remote hands at every site… You need to be informed of configuration changes and possible security risks. Receive notifications and take proactive steps to ensure uptime, whether it be through human intervention or automation scripts. Will your solution keep up with your needs?

5. Protect your Data

Is you data safe? Does your current or planned EDGE devices support the latest in data, hardware, and storage encryption protocols, and if needed, a kill switch?

6. Multi-function EDGE Device

How do you reduce the number of devices at each EDGE location you have to maintain and periodically update to help reduce power, cooling and space costs? Is there a Multi-function Edge device that provides Switching and Routing capabilities as well as VNF support and on premise vCPE, Firewall, VPN, Compute, Storage, and Failover to Cellular so I have a 24×7 virtual IT presence?

7. Telemetry

Does your solution collect critical data points, allow you to inspect data logs, build an audit trail of actions and have a dashboard for visualization KPI’s?

8. Scalability

Does your EDGE solution allow you to easily grow and rapidly scale to meet business needs; Or is it complicated, cumbersome and an overall hindrance? Can it grow with you or will it need to be replaced as you scale? Your EDGE solution needs to be easily replicated across the various branches, offices, and retail locations.

9. True Solution Cost

CAPEX and OPEX – What is the initial cost of your solution and what would it end up costing to implement, maintain, and manage? There’s money to be saved if a solution costs less to maintain. Low initial costs generally come with hefty hidden fees – Training, maintenance and operational costs all add up, and in most cases, end up costing you more in the long run. A “set it and forget it” type of solution that adds automation capabilities may have a higher initial cost, but results in a tremendous savings because it doesn’t need to be replaced as often or have dedicated staff to operate and maintain.

10. Vendor Neutrality

What good is an EDGE solution if it doesn’t play nice with other EDGE location devices? You’re at the mercy of the various device vendors, their timetables and patch schedules and applications. You need a solution that adapts to your requirements, is built on an Open Platform and allows you to integrate seamlessly with other solutions.

Bottom Line

Check out ZPE Systems family of solutions for your Data Center, Lab, and Edge location requirements. You’ll be glad you did!

Background / Problem:

A fortune 500 organization reached out to ZPE with a problem many organizations face when growing. They had multiple data centers around the world and were looking to "upgrade" their sites. They needed an out-of-band management tool that would address the following requirements:

• The solution must be able to integrate with their current networking devices.
• The customer should be able to use the Out-of-Band management platform to see and evaluate their entire network infrastructure, and make HW upgrades/refreshes in sites of need
• After the "upgrades," process, they wanted to be able to use the same singular tool for IT infrastructure management and monitoring

The Solution:

Nodegrid Manager – Search and 360° view with Cloud Clustering

Clustering is a Nodegrid feature that establishes a secure and resilient connection among other Nodegrid units so that when Cloud Clustering is enabled, multiple systems can easily have a 360° view, manage and access all devices connected to the units. This can be done for data centers and remote locations clustered logically over IP or physically over a cascade port. Nodegrid makes cloud access management even easier with cloud asset search. By logging into any Nodegrid node, users can search using natural language for existing managed devices or recently discovered devices over the entire Nodegrid-managed enterprise network and cloud with a single interface.

Implementation:

    Visibility of Current Infrastructure
The first phase consisted of replacing their existing OOB (Out-of-Band) system with ZPE’s serial consoles. With ZPE’s T-Series auto-sensing capability and enhanced hostname detection, the organization did not need to replace existing cabling and neither add port alias manually. After connecting all of their IT and Network devices (routers, switches, firewalls, storage devices, PDUs, etc) and enabling Clustering, the SysAdmins/DevOps gained visibility of the entire IT and Network infrastructure. They could now see and access every device in their network from a single user interface. No longer needed to memorize individual device IP address.

    Upgrading
With a better understanding of the devices that made up their network infrastructure, the second phase consisted of eliminating and replacing old power and network hardware. With Nodegrid, a ZTP (Zero-Touch-Provisioning) and LLDP ready and product-agnostic platform, the team could focus on purchasing products that fit their environment without having to worry about compatibility with their new OOB solution. They could purchase from any vendor.

    Monitoring and Management Capabilities
For the final phase, after each site had been upgraded, the team continued to use the Nodegrid platform to monitor and manage the new setup. The IT staff was divided into different teams, each in charge of a portion of the network; security, power, storage, etc. By setting up permission/privileges, each team could only access the target devices assigned to them, and at the same time, the Senior Network Engineer had access to the entire network.

Here is a list of 4 scenarios that helped our customer choose ZPE’s Nodegrid solution:

Scenario 1: Remote Access

The Sr. Network Engineer located in Cupertino needs to be able to see and manage all of the network devices. With Nodegrid Clustering, the engineer only needs to login once to any of the units in the cluster to have complete visibility of the network.

Scenario 2: Collaboration

Nodegrid Clustering facilitates the collaboration between engineers. Whether they are looking so solve an unknown issue or are working on a new software, Nodegrid allows up to 20 concurrent users to access the same device simultaneously. Although not recommended, each of those 20 users can have Read and Write privileges.

Scenario 3: Restricted Access

While Nodegrid can provide visibility to all the network devices, security best practices suggest some engineers/groups should only be able to access a specific set of them. Access can be granted to specific engineers or set for entire groups.

Scenario 4: Notifications/Alerts

Engineers have the ability to set parameters and thresholds that will trigger alerts. ZPE units are always listening to the target devices for these user defined thresholds, and once they are reached a notification is sent to authorized engineers. Additionally, with our automation capabilities, engineers can program auto-correcting scripts that can run in our platform.

Test Drive Nodegrid to Experience Clustering Today

We are perfectly positioned to meet anything manufacturers can throw at us. We pioneered IT infrastructure access and control back in the day and we’re pioneering IT infrastructure access and control for today and the future. Check us out. You’ll be glad you did.