11 Ways the Right Enterprise Server Can Maximize Your Flash Array Investment

It is crucial for a business person to identify the most suitable enterprise server for his/her business to ensure maximum return on investment on both the hardware and software. 

Selecting the right servers for enterprise environment means that your server is in tandem with the growth agenda you have set while having the capability to deliver high performance, scalability, and reliability. 

Here are 11 how-to’s for selecting and deploying an enterprise server that will benefit your flash array investment in a big way.  

1. Provision the Server to Existing & Future Business Needs

Depending on the circumstance, spend time prioritizing and evaluating workloads, future growth and cost. It’s important to assess CPU, memory, storage, and I/O demands of all applications, including databases, mail servers, file servers, and other LoB applications, as well as custom LoB software. 

In other words, don’t over-provision and also do not under-provision in order to have the right specifications. Ensure that there is provision for future word application usage within the next three to five years. Liaise with vendors to identify the most appropriate configuration options for the servers for enterprise hardware and software products. 

2. Virtualize to Reduce TCO, Enhance Agility, and Improve App Availability

Server virtualization is the technique of segmenting the actual physical server into independent virtual environments in order to optimize hardware resources. It offers enormous capability in terms of what can be done in terms of resource scaling, up or down, depending on the demand. 

Virtualization also allows for the rapid deployment of new VMs, makes DR planning easier through replication of virtual machines, and helps to minimize capital costs by reducing physical flash array servers and the need for physical hardware to provision new VMs. 

3. Implement Enterprise SSD Storage  

Use all-flash or hybrid storage to solve the storage choke points. SSD is a type of storage device that boasts lightning-fast read/write speeds that are up to 100x faster than spinning disks. They deliver faster access to data within applications, databases, and virtual desktops. 

Their solid-state architecture is also more reliable, having less latency or lag. To address these requirements, increasing storage performance is one of the best ways to boost user productivity and customer satisfaction levels.

4. Right-size Server Instances   

Here, it is necessary to properly size the virtual or dedicated flash array servers according to the historical and storage requirements or any performance benchmarks. Specifically, do not be tempted to overprovision vCPUs, RAM, and storage needlessly, as it will only consume resources and increase costs unnecessarily. 

Use the monitor to check the server size as well as to avoid the occurrence of a problem with the amount of work being done. Make it flexible and portable so that it can be easily expanded or scaled down depending on the needs of the business.  

5. Standardize for Efficiency and Flexibility

Set the golden build image for the operating system (OS) to patch management, configuration, and refresh processes. This saves time for the IT departments by reducing the time spent managing different versions of the software while at the same time providing the developers and business users with a uniform environment. Standardization also helps with disaster and business continuity and makes it easier to transfer loads to other servers.   

6. Implement Deduplication and Compression

Backup and archive data deduplication, along with primary storage deduplication and compression technologies, increase storage utilization. Dedupe worldwide scans and erases duplicate data within files and VMs, reducing backup time and storage space and shrinking archives. Compression brings the density of the data down before storing it. The fact that they collectively reduce the amount of storage capacity needed means that there are many advantages.  

7. Fortify Security Across Servers

Strengthen the server and virtual machine protection against malware, ransomware and similar breaches. Safeguard more essential applications as dedicated physical servers rather than virtual ones in order to protect from contamination. Implement endpoint protection with centralized management and log and event forwarding. Lockdown of modes of the device to avoid modification of specific parameters. Implement the Least Privilege Access Control. Institute rules in firewalls that regulate traffic between different VMs.   

8. Select Enterprise Hardware Because of Dependability  

Consumer-grade servers for enterprises are not very sophisticated and do not have the backup and robustness that are necessary to support a business. Specify for high-end features including hot-plug power supplies and fans, memory error checking and correcting, hot-swap hard drives, RAID disk subsystems, and Intelligent Platform Management Interface remote system administration. 

These high availability features reduce time of outage, which in turn means that the applications and services are readily available to the internal and external clients. 

9. Proper CPU cores and Memory Configuration 

Assign sufficient CPU, cores and RAM to prevent competition for the available system resources among the various virtual machines running on a physical server. Keep checking the usage of resources in various resource pools. 

Propose and fine-tune the proposed model in accordance with the highest loads observed in the corresponding category of service. This is a bad practice in a system’s design since memory overcommitment may lead to performance degradation over time. Provide some headroom during migration and upgrades as well.  

10. Select Scalable Components   

When selecting all types of servers for enterprise components, one must also consider expansion and the product’s shelf life. It’s advisable to select a chassis that can accommodate extra drive. Choose CPUs that can add cores. 

Choose processors, power supplies, RAM, or RAID cards that you can upgrade in the future. These upgrades increase the server’s usefulness. It is also essential to plan for next-generation requirements so that people can be ready to prepare for the changes that are likely to happen in the near future.   

11. Backup Critical Data   

Ensure that no data is permanently lost or rendered useless through mechanical failure, human error, or a disaster by frequently backing up the data. Implement the disk, tape and cloud-based data recovery strategies at the organizational site and offsite. 

Regular backup schedules must be set in such a way that they meet the stipulated RTO and RPO goals. Tests are restored periodically. Having copies of the data accessible in the shortest time possible is more economical than the losses that come with total deletion of the data.

Finding the Right Enterprise Server: It’s About Getting Maximum Value

Choosing the best enterprise server is a key decision that defines a solid and strong foundation to support business applications and workloads. Accurate assessment of the components and their scaling, creating conformity for these settings, and the protection of these settings guarantee the continuing support of corporate goals and objectives in the areas of productivity.