Magirus vBundle Unified Data Centre Offers Across Europe

Magirus launched across Europe its vBundle unified data centre offers, aimed specifically at the Small and Medium Enterprise (SMEs) data centre market. The competitively-priced vBundles comprise a series of computing, network, storage and data management technologies from VMware, Cisco and EMC, all integrated and pre-configured for resellers.

vBundles enable European resellers to offer a fully-functional unified data centre capability built upon VMware, Cisco and EMC technologies, priced specifically for the SME market.

The new offers will enable resellers to realise new revenue opportunities by addressing the relatively untapped, low-end market for data centre and cloud-based computing. At the same time, SMEs will benefit from technologies only affordable to larger enterprises. These benefits include lower capital outlays; simplified management; increased energy efficiency; and reduced operating costs.

vBundles are available to resellers in six variations (see below) for entry and midrange level organisations.

Magirus’ vBundles have been architected from a pricing point of view and designed with different European requirements in mind. Denise Bryant UK managing director at Magirus explains: "For the first time we have leveled the playing field for SMEs. We have effectively taken a proven framework and shrunk down the specification into more affordable data centre solutions for SMEs. Now, vBundles enable smaller organisations to have access to the benefits of technologies that were previously only affordable by larger enterprises. Variations of vBundles have been designed to address different European market requirements. For example, the UK market is interested in bundles with a fairly high configuration, with fault tolerance and redundancy built-in, whereas Spain and Italy require smaller bundles at lower prices."

The scope of every vBundle configuration can be complemented by further bespoke software and hardware components from the Magirus portfolio.

The low-end vBundles come in three different sizes. The entry level vBundle offer is designed for smaller businesses with up to 25 virtual machines. The mid-range vBundle caters for environments of up to 50 virtual machines and the high-end vBundle for up to 100 virtual machines. Both the midrange and high-end offers include an integrated storage management and virtual server infrastructure.

In future Magirus is looking to offer variations of vBundles, for example, a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) bundle, for specific market requirements.

vBundles Technical Specifications:

Protocols included on the mid-range and enterprise vBundles are Network File System (NFS); Common Interface File System (CIFS); and Internet Small Compute System Infrastructure (iSCSI).

The benefits of using NFS for data stores within VMware include a ‘single window’ for management. Also, it enables more efficient capacity utilisation; as virtual machines can be compressed on the storage array from within the VMware management console. CIFS provides the mechanism for consolidating an organisation’s file storage and takes advantage of features such as de-duplication and thin provisioning for optimising efficiency. The iSCSI option has been included for companies not wishing to use NFS for virtual machines.

Entry Level Fibre Channel Offering:

• Supports up to 25 virtual machines
• EMC Clariion AX4
• 2 x MDS 9124
• 2 x UCS C200 servers (inc. 2 x HBA cards)
• VMware Essentials Plus

Entry Level iSCSI Offering:

• Supports up to 25 virtual machines
• EMC Clariion AX4
• 2 x Cisco Catalyst 2960
• 2 x UCS C200 servers
• VMware Essentials Plus

Mid-range Level IP (NFS/iSCSI/CIFS)
and FCoE options Offering:

• Supports up to 50 virtual machines
• EMC Celerra NX4
• 2 x Nexus 5010 Switch
• 3 x UCS C200 servers (inc. 3 x CNA cards)
• Midsize Acceleration Kit
• Additional options include: 450GB 15k SAS drives and 1TB SATA drives

Enterprise Level IP (NFS/iSCSI/CIFS) Offering:

• Supports up to 100 virtual machines
• EMC Celerra NS 120
• 2 x Nexus 5010 Switch
• 4 x UCS C200 servers (inc. 4 x CNA cards)
• Enterprise Plus Acceleration Kit
• Additional options include: 450GB 15k FC drives; 1TB SATA drives; and Cisco Nexus 1000v (8 CPU)

Enterprise Level FCoE Offering:

• Supports up to 100 virtual machines
• EMC Celerra NS 120
• 2 x Nexus 5010 Switch
• 4 x UCS C200 servers (inc. 1 x CNA card dual port)
• Enterprise Plus Acceleration Kit
• Additional options include: 450GB 15k FC drives; 1TB SATA drives; and Cisco Nexus 1000v (8 CPU)