I asked a number of people:
“What is the cloud?”
There were three trends present in all of their responses:
| Location: | The cloud is not confined to my office. It is not confined to my premise. |
| Scaling Up: | Gives me more of everything when I need it. |
| Scaling Down: | Gives me less of everything when I don’t need it. |
Even when talking about something as mainstream as the cloud, there is a tendency for people, especially providers, to skip over their own definition of the cloud. Instead of focusing starting at the beginning, assumptions are made and the conversation begins immediately with the capabilities of a solution. For this reason, we make it a point to explain our definition of cloud at the beginning of every conversation. This may seem like overkill, but we believe it is important. We want to be sure everyone is on the same page.
With that out of the way, let’s get something accomplished here.
Defining Clouds at ServerCentral
When we speak about clouds at ServerCentral, we’re speaking about a collection of virtualized compute, memory, storage, network and security resources that can be applied to any type of application. These are distinct and secure resources that are provided from one of six (6) availability zones across the U.S., Asia and Europe.
What Is A Private Cloud?
When we speak about a Private Cloud, we are speaking about distinct and secure compute, memory, storage, network and security resources that are utilized by one (and only one) organization. These resources are configured to meet the specific needs of this one organization. For Private Clouds, ServerCentral manages the physical infrastructure and the virtualization layer empowering our customers to begin their involvement at the OS and application levels.
We have one goal for our Private Clouds:
Deliver an unshared, virtualized infrastructure that is tuned and managed to the customer’s exact specifications.
What Is ServerCentral’s Enterprise Cloud?
ServerCentral’s Enterprise Cloud is a set of distinct and secure compute, memory, storage, network, and security resources utilized by multiple organizations.
We have three goals for our Enterprise Cloud:
| 1. Transparency: | We accomplish this by offering pre-defined resource pools that help you quickly and cost-effectively deploy the right-sized cloud for your business requirements. You’ll always know what you’re paying. |
| 2. Performance: | We strive to provide our customers with the best performing, easiest to use multi-tenant cloud infrastructure available by delivering fully managed VMware vSphere environments on unmatched physical infrastructure. |
| 3. Support: | All Enterprise Cloud customers have access to our outstanding support organization. You’ve heard us say this time and time again, but it’s true – there are no phone trees or customer service reps. Should you have a question or need help, you’ll always speak with a real person with system-administration-level experience. |
What Powers ServerCentral’s Clouds?
- Carrier-grade networking hardware
- Top-of-the-line compute and memory
- High-performance, multi-site redundant SANs
Customers receive the same resource quality and attention to detail with both Private and Enterprise Clouds.
What’s The Difference?
You will not receive lower-quality service by selecting a shared Enterprise Cloud over a Private Cloud. Both solutions are built from the ground up to support enterprise-class applications. Sure, the SLAs are different and top-end performance will vary, but they should.
Our job is to provide a cloud that can meet or exceed YOUR operational/financial/compliance requirements.
Which Cloud Is Right for You?
As we say time and time again, the right solution is your solution. Share what you want to accomplish with us and we’ll make it happen.
If you’d like to discuss how to apply these solutions to your business or applications, let us know.
We’ll dive into more detail on this topic in our next post.
