HP recently introduced solutions based on the new HP FlexNetwork architecture, including the HP A-series 10500 campus core switch, which delivers industry-leading throughput, latency and performance for the delivery of media-rich applications.
A new HP FlexManagement solution converges physical and virtual network management in a single pane of glass, and a new virtual- and cloud-optimised network intrusion prevention system (IPS) increases security in data centres.
A core component of the HP Converged Infrastructure, the HP FlexNetwork architecture unifies network silos by ensuring industry-standard protocols are implemented consistently across all networked devices throughout an enterprise. As a result, clients are able to simplify and speed service delivery across the data centre, campus and branch, driving increased agility and innovation.
“Customers are looking for vendors driving a systemic change in networking to eliminate complexity, improve agility and increase performance,” said Michael Wilson, HP Networking channel manager, South Africa. “HP’s new modular campus switches outperform Cisco’s in-class products head-to-head in each category, while HP’s single-pane-of-glass management tool alone does what it takes Cisco 30 different tools to do.”
New HP A10500 outperforms Cisco’s flagship Catalyst switch
The campus switch segment, the largest segment of the worldwide Ethernet switch market, is forecast to reach $13,7 billion in 2011, growing from $12 billion in 2010. Clients have long required advancement in campus architectures with fewer network tiers, lower latency and significantly higher throughput to deliver on the expanding amount of multimedia content.
The HP A10500 line of campus core switches meets these needs by delivering multimedia services, such as high-definition video. It delivers 3 microsecond latency, which is 75% lower than Cisco’s Catalyst 6509, and it delivers 128 wire-speed 10GbE ports, which is 270% higher performance than the 6509.
For large campuses, a super core with 208 wire-speed 10GbE ports can be delivered with two HP A10500 switches using the HP Intelligent Resilient Framework, an HP innovation that allows multiple switches to be virtualised and operate as a single switch. The A10500 will support 100GbE with the addition of new line cards.
At the access layer of the FlexCampus, the new line cards for the HP E5400 and E8200 switches deliver up to 90% lower latency and 600% higher throughput than the Cisco Catalyst 4506. Also, the high-speed HP E-MSM460 and E-MSM466 wireless access points deliver wire-like performance of 15 high-definition video series streams per access point, which is 50% more than Cisco 1140 and 3500 series access points. These new HP access points also provide higher performance over greater distances.
Unifying physical and virtual network management
Faced with IT sprawl, the complexity of multitier deployments and increasing demand for virtualisation, clients can turn to the HP FlexNetwork architecture to simplify their networks and prepare their organisations for demanding, service-oriented computing models such as cloud, mobile computing and virtualisation.
While Cisco can require 30 separate management tools for data centre, campus and branch networks, HP delivers single-pane-of-glass management with the HP Intelligent Management Centre (IMC) across all the modular building blocks of the HP FlexNetwork architecture.
The new HP IMC version 5 manages the entire HP Networking portfolio as well as more than 2600 network devices from over 35 vendors, more than 1000 of those devices are from Cisco. HP IMC helps clients mitigate the risk of migration from proprietary legacy networks to the open, standards-based HP FlexNetwork architecture.
HP IMC version 5 provides a unified view into the virtual and physical data centre network to accelerate service delivery, simplify operations and boost network availability. It automatically discovers virtual machines, virtual switches and their relationship to the physical network, overcoming the challenges of administrating increasingly virtualised service-oriented data centres.
An upcoming version of HP IMC is planned to add automatic synchronisation of network connectivity information with HP Virtual Connect technology for server blades and further automate the process of creating a server profile, moving a step closer to one-button cloud provisioning.
“To meet network requirements of our new Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) Cloud Centres, we needed a single, scalable networking architecture that would be easy to manage across both physical and virtual domains,” said Henry Fastert, chief technologist, SHI International. “HP IMC provides us with network management and advanced automation capabilities from a single platform that allows simple and rapid service orchestration.”
Advancing security for virtual and cloud environments
Data centre application workloads are increasingly virtualised, and many legacy security solutions only protect physical environments supporting single workloads. The new HP TippingPoint S6100N IPS appliance provides organisations a single, scalable network security framework that automatically and consistently builds in protection as virtual machines are created or moved across an enterprise.
The appliance scales the HP Secure Virtual Framework to provide a single solution for physical, virtual and cloud environments. Providing up to 60% higher performance than the previous generation, the HP TippingPoint S6100N IPS can inspect up to 16 Gbps of high-bandwidth application traffic in real time to improve availability of mission-critical services.
Pricing and availability varies from product to product. For more information contact Michael Wilson on +27 (0)11 785 1000.
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