Data center capacity management software

Data centers are no exception to this reality. Practically, data center capacity planning involves a process of assessing the data center—from computing resources, cooling capacity, power load, and more—and then forming and enacting a plan to make sure that all workload demands can be met and even improved upon.

As an end result, this planning can reveal areas of improvement and potential dangers which allow leadership to enact plans for data centers to function most optimally. Planning can generally serve to enhance operations of any data center, but its importance is being underscored in light of the shifting demands on both physical and virtual assets. With environmental concerns as well as financial needs, more attention is turning to planning to prepare for the future while deferring the consequences of a lack of planning and ill-used or under-utilized assets and financial resources.

Not only does this shifting landscape reveal the need for data center capacity planning, but also such critical analysis of server hardware resources and more has multifaceted benefits to businesses and consumers.

It can give insight into power and cooling to enable optimal function for the given workload as well as attending to network and storage capacity. Careful planning can make sure that mistakes within performance are acknowledged and avoided while ensuring that mission-critical functions are not only safeguarded but also enhanced. Further, data center capacity planning can eliminate waste and idle assets while decreasing the likelihood of debilitating outages that interrupt business operations.

Basic tools such as spreadsheets traditionally were the most essential assets for planning, but now options such as 3D renderings, virtualization , cloud computing , and even outsourcing has been proffered.

One tool stands out as exponentially beneficial. It also covers all of the essential asset and configuration management features to maintain control of your infrastructure and to have every crucial information detail about your infrastructure at your fingertips. Other functional enhancements improve the execution of the additional use cases that the solution supports.

It also supports the execution of the primary and extended use cases with the highest degree of performance excellence.

Use Cases. Manage Capacity. Perform detailed planning of future business needs so you only spend funds on data center expansion when you really need to. Guarantee that computing resources, power load, white space footprint and cooling capacity will be able to meet the workload demands of users and clients Maximize existing resources and increase density Compare actual consumption to plan and analyze growth over time.

Conduct detailed planning of future business needs using reliable load and capacity displays with accurate prediction. Compare capacity usage and requirements to estimate reliable need projections. Variables used in calculations include: Historical growth rates Granular forecasts Actual planned changes Scenario planning. Manage Energy. Reduce energy cost Increase energy efficiency Reduce carbon footprint Comply with Green IT and similar regulations Reduce overprovisioning of resources while guaranteeing safe operational conditions and tier level resilience.

Avoid Stranded Capacity. Identify unused capacities and potential capacity issues in the data center Analyze actual capacity used to determine need for consolidation project or greenfield build. Manage Risk. Implement risk reduction procedures to reduce the threat of infrastructure downtime and failures. Proactive planning with tool-assisted maintenance of safe operating conditions.

Populate, Defragment, Consolidate the Floor. A DCIM with real-time monitoring can help improve Capacity Planning by Knowing and Analyzing the capacity, Predicting future capacity requirements, Evaluating the Impact of change on the data center and Optimizing capacity consumption. Capacity metrics are measured in real-time and automatically aggregated throughout the data center to improve Capacity Analysis, Planning and Optimization. Know your Capacity quickly with simple, customizable dashboards and analytics at any place in the data center.

Monitoring actual real-time power usage over time vs. Use the Composite Capacity report to help identify and balance Power, Space and Temperature to reclaim stranded capacity.