We’ve spent a lot of time over the last couple of years talking with customers in office environments about their IT needs. These customers ranged from single-site businesses like doctor’s offices and legal firms, to distributed offices of multi-site organizations like regional medical clinics and school districts, to national enterprises in the banking, retail and hospitality industries that have hundreds or even thousands of remote offices / branch offices (ROBO). These customers told us where they want their businesses and organizations to go, and about the problems they faced in getting there.
Customers have made it clear that they want to eliminate hardware complexity and sprawl. Many start with a single server, and then expand to three or four servers of different models, generations, even brands. Along the way, they installed network switches to connect the servers, and disparate storage platforms to hold their growing data. The end result is a mix of equipment with interoperability problems that takes up a lot of space, is connected by cabling spaghetti, and is a nightmare to maintain. This mess inhibits customers’ ability to support applications needed to drive business growth and improve productivity. Simply put, they want all this cleaned up, and put into a smaller package that fits next to a desk or can be tucked neatly into a back room.
Today, I am pleased to announce PowerEdge VRTX (pronounced “ver-teks”), a platform purposely engineered for those office environments. PowerEdge VRTX is the integration of servers, storage, networking and management into a compact chassis that sits beside a desk or under a counter in a bank branch or at a checkout counter in a retail shop. Into this small form factor we have integrated up to four PowerEdge M-series half-height server nodes, enough hard drives to house up to 48TB of data, and networking. Along with a locking front bezel for security and office-quiet acoustics, VRTX fits unobtrusively in open office environments, or can be rack-mounted in just 5U of rack space.
PowerEdge VRTX eliminates integration problems and ensures confident deployment and efficient operation by not only integrating, but also providing pre-tested and certified storage, networking, OS’s, hypervisors and systems management for smooth roll-out and operation. With ease of setup and compact form, future upgrades such as adding server nodes or additional storage becomes a simple task.
VRTX brings simplicity, efficiency and IT agility to our customers’ office environments. I invite you to learn more about VRTX and its unprecedented design and capabilities by visiting the product page. To learn more about the simplified systems management capabilities, read Kevin Noreen’s blog here.
