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MATRIX SWITCH TECHNOLOGY CAN DELIVERSIGNIFICANT SAVINGS
Every business today is digging deep to
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nd ways of reducing operating costs to remain pro
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 table and enablereinvestment for continued competitiveness. Many are
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nding opportunities in their data centers – in particular, that technology can signi
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cantly decrease their energyconsumption and costs. Until recently, this may have beenperceived as an issue for facilities managers. However,global economic conditions, mounting pressures onpro
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 tability and other factors have combined to makeenergy cost containment an issue for all enterprisemanagers and executives.Whether an on-line retailer,
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nancial services company, telecommunication provider or airline, today’s enterprisedepends on a network as the essential business backbone.In turn, data centers housing these networks depend onan array of equipment to monitor network performance, troubleshoot problems and maintain uptime. It’s notunusual for an enterprise to support its high-speed networkinfrastructure with dozens of monitoring devices – perhapshundreds in the case of data centers in multiple locations– and the resulting energy costs generated by this array of devices are far from trivial.
Putting the Problem in Perspective
Several recent reports give perspective to the energyconsumption issue. According to a study by the EPA, U.S.data centers consumed 61 billion kWh in 2006 – more than double the amount consumed in 2000 – at a cost of $4.5 billion. Another report, by the analyst
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rm IDC, notes that the average equipment rack 10 years ago held sevenservers that each consumed an average of 100 watts; the number today is up to 22 servers per rack with powerconsumption at an average of 400 watts per device. And these numbers are only growing. The EPA acknowledges that under current ef 
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ciency models data center powerconsumption could double again by 2011.
Cutting Energy Costsin Enterprise Data Centers
Electronic Device Sharing EliminatesRedundant Monitoring & Security Devices
Top and bottom: Conventional and more cost-effective monitoring con
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gurations
 As written for Communication News – July 2008
 
Surprisingly, the majority of businesses surveyed by IDC don’t know howmuch power is being consumed per square foot in their data centers,much less the consumption by devices used for network monitoring. Butan educated guess says that if the average monitoring device consumes450 watts at full load, then, for example, a major
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nancial servicescompany with 600 monitoring devices deployed in its data centerswould consume over 270kW per hour – at an average cost of $.08 perkilowatt hour, that’s signi
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cant. And that’s only half the equation.Cooling is the other half. Referring again to the IDC study, data centermanagers today are simply addressing this challenge by pushing morecold air through raised
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oors, or rearranging equipment in hot/coolzones so that air intakes on certain devices are drawing cool air.They’re not focused on reducing the overall thermal footprint of  their data centers.
Fewer Devices = Lower Power Consumption
Many will likely point to more ef 
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cient power management and deviceusage as a way to cut power consumption, but why not simply cut thenumber of devices? While this suggestion might sound inconceivable, the technology that makes it possible is available today – it’s calleda matrix switch. Think of this technology as an electronic patchpanel controlled by software. It enables the dynamic re-allocation of monitoring equipment, therein signi
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cantly reducing the number of devices needed to maintain total network visibility and, in turn, lowering overall power consumption.The
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gure on page 1 illustrates the point. First, the conventionalapproach, where each monitoring device is connected one-to-one to adedicated Layer 2 switch. Second, the cost effective approach, wherea single monitoring device is connected to a matrix switch, which thenconnects to the same array of Layer 2 switches. This implementationassures the same instant device access as the conventional one-to-onedeployment, but does so in a way that utilizes fewer total devices –hence the energy savings.
“This implementationassures the sameinstant device accessas the conventionalone-to-one deployment,but does so in a way that utilizes fewer totaldevices – hence theenergy savings.”
 
Financial Institution Cuts 66 Percent of Monitoring Devices
The
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nancial institution mentioned earlier required a one-to-one ratio formonitoring equipment in its data centers and had an array of 600 devices to accomplish the task. By deploying a set of matrix switches, they wereable to maintain 100 percent network visibility while eliminating two-thirdsof their devices – cutting the total number of installed monitoring devicesdown to 200. While the company hasn’t done an of 
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cial calculation, wecan surmise that 400 fewer monitoring devices resulted in a signi
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cantreduction in power consumption.Having fewer active devices also reduces the data center’s thermal load,which in turn helps to extend the shelf-life of monitoring devices, cutting down on maintenance and repair costs, and reducing the overall cost of cooling the facility.
Don’t Forget the “Hidden” Energy Costs
There is another signi
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cant factor to the equation – the cost of humanenergy. In a data center that lacks both matrix switches and a one-to-one device ratio, engineers are forced to physically move and re-cablemonitoring devices to diagnose the network problems that arise. Thisrequires the engineer to stop whatever he or she is doing, go to the datacenter, un-cable and re-cable devices until the issue is located, resolve the issue, and then go back to his or her workstation. Assuming thisprocess goes smoothly, it can take perhaps 15-30 minutes; much longerif the issue is dif 
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cult to resolve, the data center has an extensive array of equipment or is in a remote location.With a matrix switch deployment in place, however, the network engineercan manage the entire monitoring infrastructure from a remote computerscreen and make device changes instantly – and securely – via thesoftware interface. Connecting a device from one network port to anotheris accomplished with a simple mouse click; and all in a matter of seconds.Considering the salary for a typical network engineer, the time savings canquickly add up to thousands of dollars. In the case of large enterpriseswith many network engineers, these “manual energy” cost savings can bemonumental.
“By deploying a setof matrix switches,they were able tomaintain 100 percentnetwork visibility whileeliminating two-thirdsof their devices.”
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