Why Enterprises Replace End-of-Life Serial Consoles With Gen 3 Out-of-Band
Serial consoles and out-of-band management requirements have changed significantly. Simple terminal servers and serial switches are no longer enough to meet high demands for availability, security, and overall resilience. The new best practice adopted by hyperscalers and enterprise is to build an Isolated Management Infrastructure (IMI). This ensures resilient access to data centers, colos, branch, and remote sites. The only drop-in solution is the Gen 3 serial console, which was developed with direct input from the world’s largest tech giants.
Below are the four reasons why hyperscalers and enterprises are migrating to Gen 3 out-of-band. Follow these criteria when procuring and architecting your EOL upgrade.
1. Ransomware
Ransomware isn’t a matter of if, but when. Gartner calls it the modern disaster, and it continues to disrupt top orgs (CISA, Dutch Defense, Change Healthcare, Casinos, etc.). Gen 2 lacks the infrastructure components that allow for rapid ransomware recovery, meaning attacks persist for weeks, months, or years.
Enterprises look for:
Gen 3 solutions capable of automatically deploying ransomware recovery environments and CVE patches in minutes via fully isolated management infrastructure.
2. Outages
Human error in change management is the leading cause of outages. The FAA outage, Southwest Airlines outage, and even the MGM breach/outage were due to staff unwittingly making change errors. Gen 2 requires manual config changes and management that are often pushed directly to production. Errors often force truck rolls and prolonged outages that cost thousands per incident.
Enterprises look for:
Gen 3 solutions with fully isolated, cloud-based management where teams can test and implement config changes, and automatically restore golden configurations in case of errors.
3. Complexity
Organizations require networking that simply works when and where they need it. But Gen 2 vendors require complex networking stacks and disjointed connectivity, which cause more work for IT teams. Gen 2 vendors also promote 5G capabilities but lack global certification, limiting 5G deployments to only certain regions.
Enterprises look for:
Gen 3 solutions that enable simple and flexible deployments, by combining six or more functions into one device, consolidating networking and tunneling, and providing globally-certified 5G.
4. Mandates
New global mandates require organizations to shore-up their network infrastructure. PCI v4, NIS2, and DORA are just a few new mandates that require one-month patching, regular vulnerability testing, and physical control plane isolation. Gen 2 devices simply lack the onboard components and openness to accommodate these requirements.
Enterprises look for:
Gen 3 solutions that enable compliance through automated patching, VM/Docker app hosting, logical and physical control plane separation, and cloud-based service chaining and orchestration.
Learn More About Gen 3
The Gen 3 serial console is the latest innovation in out-of-band management.
Learn why 6 of the Top 10 Global Tech Giants depend on ZPE Systems’ Gen 3 out-of-band for their environment. Get access to our exclusive trade-in program, and set up a demo at the links below.
Read more about Gen 3 Out-of-Band Innovations ➔
Watch Our Gen 3 Out-of-Band Explainer
