Liberty Group has invested in storage area network (SAN) technology to dramatically consolidate its server environment, improve reliability and reduce costs. The SAN solution, designed and implemented by Dimension Data Enterprise Systems, is already providing the financial services giant with tangible benefits.
With phase one now complete, Liberty Group is reaping the rewards of the Compaq SAN technology, including redundancy and major cost savings as a result of simplification, improved backup capability and enhanced capacity management.
"We are seeing definite benefits as far as redundancy and reliability are concerned," says Leon Basson, Strategic Planning - Network Services, head of Network Services, Liberty Group.
"Now, if one server fails, another takes over immediately with only a very brief period of slight performance degradation. Our users are not even aware of a problem. In the past, the failure of a single file server, in the worst case, could impact 1 500 people for as long as eight hours.
"Capacity management is also already a lot more precise, and we are getting better utilisation from our server investment. Data backup capability has improved as this process is now more structured, and takes less time. We can now backup offline, no longer impacting the performance of our network."
Liberty Group began investigating server consolidation two years ago. Since standardising on Microsoft Windows 2000 Advanced Server as the software platform for application, file and print services, the company has seen a steady growth in the number of discrete servers of different types and configurations. Providing technical support in this environment had become challenging, inefficient and costly.
The server consolidation project was launched to find a solution that would dramatically reduce the number of servers to be maintained and administered, and scale with simplicity in terms of processor and storage capacity. The business needed 100% availability for critical applications, improved backup and restoration of data, and reduced total cost of management of the server environment.
"Like many large businesses, we needed to stop the run-away growth of servers," says Basson. "The larger the server farm and disk servers, the bigger the maintenance problems and costs, and the more complex the set-up, the more it impacts on reliability."
Liberty Group therefore underwent an extensive year-long testing phase during which it investigated a number of SAN solutions. The SAN solution from Compaq and Dimension Data was chosen following a successful pilot test and evaluation.
The SAN is an independent network of storage and servers, separate from the LAN. Most storage activities do not burden the LAN, increasing performance of other mission-critical applications.
"The Compaq solution met our requirements far more closely than any of the others we tested," says Leon Basson, consultant: Strategic Planning, Liberty Group. "We were also reassured by the percentage of Microsoft`s installed base using the solution.
"We chose to work with Dimension Data as we had partnered with the company on numerous projects, and felt comfortable dealing with them. The company is also our preferred supplier in the server environment."
The solution, worth over R5.5 million, involved consolidating 20 existing servers into a cluster of two Compaq 8500 servers running in a fully redundant cluster configuration. The balance of servers was also clustered. Dual fibre channels were provided for every component for added fault tolerance. All data is stored in the disk storage array, which is a fully redundant raid configuration.
The Liberty StorageTek tape library will connect to the SAN and disk array for high speed offline backups. Additional servers can be connected to the cluster as required, and upgrades can be made to the cluster servers themselves. The Compaq SAN is a fully managed system, with a simple, Web-based GUI interface.
Phase One is now complete. Phase Two begins in June and will be completed in the third quarter of 2001.
"We were impressed with the way Dimension Data handled the implementation," says Basson. "They used professional project management, meticulous planning, and achieved all their targets in what was a very complicated consolidation process involving the restructure of the entire server environment and changes to workstations."
Share
Dimension Data Holdings plc is a leading global network services and i-Commerce solutions provider, focused on enabling enterprises, telecommunications service providers and new economy companies to communicate and transact effectively in an e-enabled environment.
Listed on the London Stock Exchange, Dimension Data is a constituent of the FTSE 100 index. The group operates in over 30 countries on six continents. It has achieved a three-year compound annual growth rate in US dollars of 73% in revenue and 36% in basic earnings per share. For more information, please go to www.didata.com.