Streamline Data Center Operations

The Cisco Unified Computing System is the next-generation data center platform. Designed to improve IT responsiveness to rapidly changing business demands, it accelerates the delivery of new services simply, reliably, and securely, through end-to-end provisioning and migration support for both virtualized and non-virtualized systems.

The Cisco Unified Computing System delivers the next step in the Data Center 3.0 vision. It unifies network, compute, storage access, and virtualization resources in a cohesive system to:

• Reduce total cost of ownership
• Increase business agility
• Improve productivity

Based on industry standards, the Unified Computing System is designed to:

• Streamline data center resources
• Scale service delivery
• Radically reduce the number of devices requiring setup, management, power/cooling, and cabling

Unified Computing and Data Center Evolution

Virtualization has created a market transition where IT organizations are trying to reduce costs and increase flexibility. Despite this, IT organizations are constantly working against existing rigid, inflexible hardware platforms. As a consequence, data center administrators have had to spend significant time on manual procedures for basic tasks instead of focusing on more strategic, proactive initiatives.

The Cisco Unified Computing System is a next-generation data center platform that unites compute, network, storage access, and virtualization into a cohesive system designed to reduce TCO and increase business agility. The system integrates a low-latency, lossless 10GE unified network fabric with enterprise-class, x86-architecture servers. The system is an integrated, scalable, multichassis platform in which all resources participate in a unified management domain.

Managed as a single system whether it has 1 server or 320 servers with thousands of virtual machines, this approach decouples scale from complexity. The Cisco Unified Computing System accelerates the delivery of new services simply, reliably, and securely through end-to-end provisioning and migration support for both virtualized and non-virtualized systems.

The Cisco Unified Computing System is designed to deliver:

• Reduced total cost of ownership (TCO) at the platform, site, and organizational levels
• Increased IT staff productivity and business agility through just-in-time provisioning and mobility support for both virtualized and nonvirtualized environments
• A seamless integrated system that is managed, serviced, and tested as a whole
• Scalability through a design for up to 320 discrete servers and thousands of virtual machines, and the ability to scale I/O bandwidth to match demand
• Industry standards supported by a partner ecosystem of industry leaders

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The Cisco Unified Computing System is built from the following components:

• Cisco UCS 6100 Series Fabric Interconnects is a family of line-rate, low-latency, lossless, 10-Gbps Cisco Data Center Ethernet and FCoE interconnect switches that consolidate I/O within the system. Both 20-port 1RU and 40-port 2RU versions accommodate expansion modules that provide Fibre Channel and/or 10 Gigabit Ethernet connectivity.
• Cisco UCS 5100 Series Blade Server Chassis supports up to eight blade servers and up to two fabric extenders in a 6RU enclosure without the need for additional management modules.
• Cisco UCS 2100 Series Fabric Extenders bring unified fabric into the blade-server chassis, providing up to four 10-Gbps connections each between blade servers and the fabric interconnect, simplifying diagnostics, cabling, and management.
• Cisco UCS B-Series Blade Servers based on next generation Intel Xeon processors adapt to application demands, intelligently scale energy use, and offer best-in-class virtualization. Each blade server utilizes network adapters for access to the unified fabric. Cisco's unique memory-expansion technology substantially increases the memory footprint, maximizing performance and capacity for demanding virtualization and large-dataset workloads. In addition, the technology offers a more cost-effective memory footprint for less-demanding workloads.
• Cisco UCS Network Adapters are offered in a mezzanine-card form factor. Three types of adapters offer a range of options to meet application requirements, including adapters optimized for virtualization, compatibility with existing driver stacks, or efficient, high-performance Ethernet.
• Cisco UCS Manager provides centralized management capabilities that serve as the central nervous system of the Cisco Unified Computing System. Cisco UCS Manager is the embedded software that unifies system components into a seamless, cohesive, system.

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