Author Archive
Who Still Needs Colocation?
Cloud hosting has been getting a lot of press in recent years. It’d be easy to assume that everything is going to “the cloud.” With promises of lower CAPEX and higher elasticity, some business owners might feel obligated to move everything over. But is that the best choice for all organizations? Statistically, most companies still […]
Disaster Recovery Finally Affordable for SMBs
Any company that relies on computers to store and process data should understand the importance of backups. Unfortunately, many small and medium-sized businesses feel overwhelmed at the prospect and don’t know how to proceed. Sound familiar? Thanks to free and easy to use software, sensible off-site backups for disaster recovery can now be accomplished cheaply […]
Data Center Sustainability Improvements Via Free Cooling
Water Side Economizing Also known as “free cooling,” water side economizing provides significant energy efficiencies because it doesn’t rely on traditional refrigeration. For this final post in my series about energy saving data center cooling strategies I’ll focus on the significant role water side economizing plays in modern data center HVAC (Heating Venting Air […]
Why Your Data Center Should Have Aisle Containment
As I say in my previous blog post, data centers in the United States use a full 1% of the nation’s power so improving efficiencies makes very real sense. In this series of blog posts about HVAC (Heating Venting Air Conditioning) cooling strategies for computers I summarize the main elements you should focus on to make […]
Data Center Cooling Optimizations Bring Big Wins
At XMission we have just completed some significant energy efficiency improvements in our data center. To educate the public and our customers as well as promote sustainable energy practices, I will be writing some blog posts about industry trends and the steps we have taken at XMission to dramatically improve our energy efficiencies. These best […]
Colocation or Cloud?
With so much media attention focused on cloud hosting, companies might feel compelled to move everything there. We all have those IT decision maker moments where the status quo no longer works and we realize that we need to stop mulling over the options and actually pick a new solution for X. Perhaps your current […]
Data Centers: A Dramatically Changing Industry
NOTE: I wrote the following while preparing to be on a panel discussion at the University of Utah recently regarding the data center industry. The data center and telecommunications industry is a dynamic, even mercurial, industry full of change, opportunity, and often unpredictable challenges. I’ve worked in this industry for 17 years and thought it might be helpful to provide […]
Upcoming XMission Data Center Upgrades
An industry pioneer since 1993, XMission always seeks out the best emerging technologies available to improve our product portfolio. During the second half of 2013, for example, XMission is performing significant upgrades to its data center infrastructure which will dramatically improve cooling efficiency and effectiveness. We are also adding a solar panel array. HVAC (Heating Venting […]
Offsite Backups: a key business continuity strategy
Off-site backups are like a daily exercise regimen. They’re both obviously a very good idea but in the abstract seem daunting to implement. Certainly an off-site backup solution will cost a lot, both up front and ongoing, right? Actually, it might not cost as much as you might expect. If your business has a somewhat […]
What is PCI Compliance and why should you care?
What is the PCI DSS? The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) was developed by the PCI Security Standards Council many years ago to provide “an actionable framework for developing a robust account data security process – including preventing, detecting and reacting to security incidents.” While the credit card industry outlines policies and […]