As IT Examiner reported today, Cisco and Accenture have introduced four new solutions based on the 'unified computing system'. The platform was apparently designed to bridge data centre silos into a single, unified architecture using industry standard technologies.

'The Unified Computing System unites compute, network, storage access, and virtualisation resources in a single energy efficient system that can reduce IT infrastructure costs and complexity, help extend capital assets and improve business agility well into the future,' the company said.

However, Hewlett Packard (HP) and Brocade responded to Cisco's claims with open skepticism.

'After all the hype, I am a little surprised by what Cisco announced, because HP has developed and delivered the same solutions with blade servers for many years,' Gary Thome, director, strategy and architecture, infrastructure software and blades, HP told IT Examiner. 'The server sector is certainly a very competitive and challenging market to get involved in. A variety of skills, including application expertise and data centre skill are required. Our experience is one of comprehensive infrastructure, whereas Cisco's ideas originate from a purely network-centric perception.'

'Cisco's network-centric view of the data centre is great for bandwidth management, but leaves a lot to chance in terms of service level delivery as well as data reliability and accessibility. The architecture does not unify management, but uses proprietary network-based management structure as the point of control. This is not 'unification' - this is a change of control,' said Thome. 'There is considerable workload balancing, policy enforcement, compliance, replication, optimisation and power management that happen at the server and the storage levels. 'Checking in' with the network administrator every time a change needs to be made could have disastrous consequences.'

In addition, Thome claimed that Cisco's new protocol, Vntag, was not compatible with current networking equipment or servers.

'In order to get the benefits of Cisco’s virtual I/O, customers will need to do a forklift upgrade of their existing networking and server equipment. It all adds up to be the world's most expensive virtual infrastructure - and that's even before you look at the ongoing management/maintenance/services costs,' explained Thome. 'This is why many position the Cisco solution as a 'clean sheet' for companies with no existing IT infrastructure. What company can afford to build silos like this?'

Brocade spokesperson Elizabeth Walther also questioned Cisco's approach to unified computing.

'Cisco's approach to 'unified computing' is not revolutionary. Many companies with extensive experience, including Brocade, in solving complex data center issues are already working on solutions. Cisco's approach is likely to be very capital intensive up front, which will be a major obstacle in light of today's global economy. The challenge at hand - the evolution of the data center to a dynamic, fully virtualised state - is extremely complex and should (take advantage of) open architectures and industry standards,' commented Walther. X

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