Ready to buy a Cluster for your application but where to turn to?Heidelberg 21 jun 2002 Doug Johnson from Western Scientific ran through the different criteria which are needed for a customer to qualify the right cluster manufacturer. There are seven criteria to consider defining whether the manufacturer has cluster experience and technical expertise. Is he a single source supplier for total system requirements? Can he offer scalability? What is the company background? What about services and support, not to mention value?
Talking about cluster experience, Mr. Johnson referred to the number of installations, the size of the systems, and the type of markets that are served by the cluster expert. The technical expertise comes down to an analysis of the company's state-of-the-art product development. Is the manufacturer able to provide multi-architecture support and solutions for a good power and cooling management? Is there any relevant experience in system integration? Have the clusters been through a benchmarking process?
As for the software support, there has to be Operating System knowledge and experience, also with regard to system drivers and application software. Mr Johnson stressed the importance of choosing a manufacturer as a single source supplier for the entire computing cycle of tasks involving computing, networking, storage, backup taking, servers, and workstations. When it comes to scalability, the cluster has to be expandable and upgradeable.
It goes practically without saying that the manufacturer of choice has to be financially secure, offer sufficient facilities, and be in business for a considerable number of years. He has to be able to provide services and support with competitive pricing and a quick responsive time.
The last criterion is value by which Doug Johnson means to identify items such as total cost of ownership, reliability, price, serviceability and delivery. The customer can only be successful in buying the right cluster if he went through the whole process of criteria matching.
Leslie Versweyveld |
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