Survey says: Data center virtualization an opportunity for cabling

Not long ago CommScope issued a report entitled Innovating in a Time of Change: Investment and Technical Trends in the Data Center. Some of the highlights from that report have been published in the November issue of Cabling Installation and Maintenance. Or they can be seen here, explained by CommScope's George Brooks.

I had the fortunate opportunity to speak with Mr. Brooks shortly after the report was issued. Our conversation involved many of the topics addressed in our November issue and in the aforementioned video. But following is an item from our conversation that didn't make it into either.

Globally, 72 percent of respondents to CommScope's survey said they had less than half their servers connected to a Fibre Channel SAN. Ten percent said their data centers had no Fibre Channel SAN at all, including 16 percent of those in North America.

At first glance that looks like an enormous opportunity to install new networks and the cabling that goes in them. But Brooks put those figures into perspective. He told me, "SANs are used for applications that require low latency and higher bandwidth. Transactional applications such as email, databases, and image transfer require and reside on a SAN. Other aplications, which do not require low latency and high bandwidth, generally are connected to NAS [network attached storage], which is generally a less-expensive form of storage. Putting those applications on a SAN is not cost-effective. My belief is that the large portion [of servers not connected to Fibre Channel SANs] are probably connected via NAS. The NAS is connected, but probably using Cat 6 cabling. If I had applications that didn't require high bandwidth and low latency, I wouldn't be spending a lot of money."

Great. So much for a cabling opportunity. But wait! Brooks further explained, "The opportunity is with virtualization. As servers virtualize, more of those applications will virtualize. They'll need a bigger pipe, and that's where the opportunity is."

So virtualiztion, then, which is feared in some camps as the beginning of the end of data centers, may actually boost the amount of cabling being deployed in those facilities. That's worth keeping an eye on.