How to Effectively Manage Your Hardware in Colocation Data Centers.
Businesses can deploy their infrastructure using colocation data centers without having to construct and maintain their own facilities, which is one of its main advantages.
A challenge of colocation, however, is maintaining hardware. What is your management and monitoring strategy if the data center where your servers are housed is owned and operated by someone else?
There are various possible responses. Let us investigate them by talking about methods for overseeing hardware owned by customers in colocation centers.
Hardware and Colocation Data Centers: A Primer
A colocation data center is an establishment where several businesses can place servers and other IT equipment. This distinguishes colocation from a data center that an organization constructs and manages exclusively for its own needs.
A colocation facility differs from a public cloud data center in another way: the latter does not permit companies to set up their own servers or other hardware. In the public cloud, on the other hand, users "rent" servers that are owned and operated by the cloud provider and made available via an IaaS model.
If you choose to set up servers in a colocation facility, you are ultimately in charge of maintaining the hardware since you are the one who owns it. Your hardware is housed in a data center that is owned and run by someone else, which might limit your access to it.
Effective management of hardware in colocation data centers is crucial for businesses to maximize control and optimize their infrastructure (Image: Alamy)
Approaches to Maintaining Colocated Data Center Hardware
There are four main ways to maintain your equipment in a colocation data center:
1. Sending Staff to the Colocation Facility
The simplest way for a business to manage hardware in a colocation data center is to send its own staff members there. They can then configure and control their hardware as needed from there.
The highest degree of access and control over colocated hardware is offered by this method. The expense of sending employees to a remote colocation site is a drawback, though. The facility's owners and operators may also impose limitations on the hours that your employees can enter and stay. The majority of colocation providers will not permit their clients' engineers to set up a permanent on-site presence or hang out there indefinitely.
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2. Outsourcing Maintenance to the Colocation Provider
Colocation providers frequently provide managed services to keep their clients' colocated hardware in good working order.
In a similar spirit, colocation providers can provide a variety of services. While some may provide only basic monitoring or troubleshooting, for example, others may handle every facet of hardware setup and maintenance.
As a result, in order to complete duties that the operator won't, you might need to dispatch employees of your own to a colocation site on occasion. However, partnering with a colocation provider can be one approach to handle the majority of hardware management duties without incurring the expense or complexity of regularly deploying your own staff.
3. Outsourcing to a Third Party
Another possibility is to contract with outside managed service providers (MSPs) to handle hardware management. This entails contracting with an outside company, separate from the colocation provider, to arrange, oversee, and maintain colocated hardware.
This model is contingent upon your colocation provider granting the MSP access to its facilities, and you remain subject to any access restrictions that the colocation provider may impose. However, in general, this strategy might work out easier or more affordable than using your own employees. Additionally, a colocation provider might not be able to match an MSP's pricing or level of hardware management services.
4. Remote Hardware Management
Naturally, there is also the option of remote management for colocated hardware, which can be combined with any of the previously mentioned strategies.
To remotely manage hardware, one must establish a network connection. Generally, for this to function, your hardware must be directly connected to the internet. Nevertheless, some colocation providers provide solutions that allow you to interface with hardware that is not connected to a network, like Equinix's Serial over SSH.
Naturally, installing hardware or replacing malfunctioning parts cannot be done via remote management; such tasks require physical workers on the ground. However, remote access makes management tasks possible, such as installing software updates or, in certain situations, even installing new operating systems, once servers are up and running.
Colocation Hardware Management: Finding the Best Fit
Though it need not be difficult, maintaining colocated hardware can be intimidating. Supporting hardware inside a building you do not own is doable enough, whether you choose to send employees on-site, collaborate with a third party, or use a combination of these strategies. The process is further streamlined by having the option to rely on remote management solutions for specific needs.
Conclusion:?
In a colocation data center, hardware management calls for thorough planning, effective tools, and effective communication. You can minimize expenses and risks while optimizing the security and dependability of your hardware by adhering to these best practices.