Sunday, February 10, 2008

Cisco Nexus 7000 stands alone in term of Virtualization Capabilities

Forbes
Andy Greenberg, January 28, 2008, Cisco's Big Switch

The Nexus 7000 really gets interesting, says Yankee Group analyst Zeus Kerravala, when it's combined with another revolutionary IT innovation: virtualization.

Today, virtualization increases a data center's efficiency by about 25%, Kerravala estimates. But in combination with a switch like the Nexus, virtualization could mean cooperation between multipurpose servers across cities and time zones. "It's like in Star Trek, when Sulu would transfer power from life support to shields," Kerravala says. "You don't have resources just sitting around anymore. You pool all your resources together no matter where they are."

Brocade's switch can't connect data centers over vast distances like the Nexus, making it less attractive in an increasingly virtualized IT world. "Cisco has created the switch for the new virtualized data center," says Cindy Borovick, an analyst with IDC. "They're the leader in this field."

Computer World
Matt Hamblen, January 28, 2008, Cisco unveils the Nexus 7000, its biggest switch ever

Zeus Kerravala, an analyst at Yankee Group Research Inc., said the Nexus 7000 "sets a new bar" and will serve well in data centers with virtualized pools of computing resources, whether they be processing, memory or storage. "Cisco has built a box that meets data center needs today and one that will allow for enterprises to implement a larger virtualization vision," he said. Cisco's competitors don't come close to the Nexus 7000, he said, because it provides network and computing innovations together.

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