Time to Get Virtual with Data Virtualization

Go look in your server room right now. How many machines do you see? If you have more than one, it’s time to utilize data virtualization

What Are the Business Benefits of Data Virtualization?

Data virtualization can help you improve your company in a number of ways. Not only will it save you money in the long run, it can also increase uptime, save energy, and improve disaster recovery. Here are some reasons why you should implement data virtualization:

• Save Energy – By implementing data virtualization, you no longer have to pay for the energy used to cool and store multiple machines. You also reduce your environmental footprint, which is great if you’re trying to go green!
• Reduce Your Data Center Footprint – By consolidating your servers, you are reducing the size of your data center. If you use co-location, you can save money on the amount of floor space you are taking up with fewer racks.
• Quick Expansion – Data virtualization allows you to quickly expand to full capacity within minutes if you find the need. You no longer have to wait for setup of a new server to get more bandwidth.
• Reduce Vendor Dependence – When you virtualize your data, your risk of vendor dependency plummets. You are no longer tied to one vendor and gain the flexibility to shop around as much as you’d like.
• Increase Uptime – Data virtualization can nearly eliminate downtime. Because your data is partitioned, if one server goes down, your data is automatically switched to a failover to keep you up and running.
• Improve Disaster Recovery – Virtualization usually comes with automatic failover testing, so you’ll know that your BDR plan works before you actually need to use it.
• Isolate Applications – By utilizing virtualization, your business gains the ability to run multiple applications on one server, without the compatibility issues.
• Extend Useful Life of Older Applications – Data virtualization allows you to encapsulate legacy applications and gain more use out of them.

Time to Get Virtualized!

All those sound like great benefits to data virtualization, don’t they? But how do you do it? If you don’t have an IT provider or if you’re using an in-house IT department, you may not have known that virtualization could drastically change how your company operates. Luckily NorthLight IT can help in your transition.