Stories by: Paul Venezia

Back in the old days, the only realistic way to connect multiple remote sites was by T1 or T3 delivered either point-to-point or via Frame Relay. These were either slow and expensive or fast and unbelievably expensive. Then came MPLS, which dispensed with the need for point-to-point circuits from site to site, but was still bound by high expense. You got what you paid for. These circuits were not only reliable, but if a T1 or T3 circuit dropped, you could generally count on the carrier to jump on the problem quickly and resolve it with some expediency.

There comes a time in most businesses when circumstances dictate that one or more users work from home either full- or part-time. In other cases, it may simply be convenient for business owners and employees to be able to use company resources from home or (unfortunately) while on vacation.

As we rapidly approach yet another VMworld conference and the general release of VMware vSphere 5, it's clear that VMware hasn't been resting on its laurels. The newest version of vSphere builds on the strong foundations of vSphere 4.1, showcasing new management and automation features and levels of scalability.

Citrix XenServer is a commercial implementation of the open source Xen virtualization solution. Citrix has extended the base Xen engine with management tools and tightened up various components related to implementing and managing Windows and Linux virtual machines, not to mention integrating the whole shebang with the company's virtual desktop initiative, as well as its foundational server-based desktop and application delivery solutions.

There's an area of the NAS landscape where the lines between consumer and corporate use are blurred. While high-end NAS arrays cost plenty of money, they also provide essential features like redundant power supplies and superior performance. At the lower end are the truly consumer-grade devices that might seem like they'll work in a corporate environment but fall short of meeting the essentials critical to infrastructures. They are, however, very cheap.

After finally getting the go-ahead to proceed with a project to virtualize a small business infrastructure, it may seem that the hard part is actually making it all happen. In many cases, however, the hardest part is getting the budget together to acquire all the hardware and software necessary -- actually making the switch is the easier task.

There are two ways to look at the Cisco SA 520 network security appliance. On one hand, it offers a solid array of features: 65Mbps IPSec VPN throughput, 100Mbps overall throughput, integrated firewall (limited to 100 rules), built-in filtering for common services like IM and P2P networking, SSL VPN, IPS, DDNS, and multi-WAN support. On the other hand, it has nearly no relation to the rest of Cisco's security solutions.

After all the hype about the new MacBook Air releases last week, all the oohing and aahing over the engineering that slipped a significant amount of power and capability into such a tiny package, I was ready to be somewhat disappointed by the new 13.3-inch MacBook Air that arrived on my doorstep earlier this week. I've used every MacBook Air since it was originally released, and I still use an 18-month-old Air for hours and hours every day. What could impress me about the new one? As it turns out, plenty.

Corralling the myriad physical and virtual servers that exist in IT shops of any size is a daunting task, and management tools that ease the burden are in hot demand. Naturally, all of the big guys are out to win this "adaptive infrastructure management" sweepstakes. HP threw its hat into this ring with HP BladeSystem Matrix in the first half of 2009, and Cisco entered the fray with Cisco UCS later in the year. Now it's Dell's turn.

Dell's Advanced Infrastructure Manager (AIM) is designed to automate a wide variety of common administration tasks, from server provisioning to failure management. Thus, it stands to reason that Dell also aims to reduce the overhead of service procurement, but that is not a job for AIM alone.