In line with the emerging worldwide trend of "re-centralising" data and application servers, the JSE-listed Seartec Industries (Pty) Ltd, which includes Sharp Electronics & Scripto, has turned to the WAN and corporate ISP fundi outfit - Crystal River Corporation.
The goal: To design, deploy and maintain a clinical - bullet-proof - infrastructure that had an immediate impact on the user`s perception and data flow across the WAN.
* Maximise the usage of Diginet lines between JHB - CPT - Durban.
* Increase bandwidth for Terminal Server/Citrix clients without increasing Telkom Diginet lines.
* Increase application speeds without upgrading hardware.
* Manage quality of service.
* Provide a licence-free e-mail server system with centralised LDAP address book for MS-Outlook.
* Provide Web control filtering that allows time-based browsing for users to specific sites.
* Maximise utilisation/minimise costs.
* 24/7/365 fault-tolerance.
"Data and application centralisation is the emerging IT infrastructure worldwide. There is a definite trend to consolidate company data and application servers in a centralised HQ facility, most often on-site at the head office. This obviously lowers the costs involved as companies no longer need to be concerned about expensive replication infrastructures and deployment headaches," says Stephen Abraham, MD of Crystal River Corporation.
"In the past, replication and slow, expensive Diginet links were the only choices available and companies have become used to that. More recently ISPs have been offering VPN solutions across their backbones. But these local VPN solutions are not the best answer by any means for any company with a local WAN scenario. They are better off doing it themselves with a company like Crystal River. We have proved this for Sharp SA."
Says Immo Steffens, Sharp Electronics IT manager: "We were sceptical at first, but we now have the most clinical and robust infrastructure in my 20 years at Sharp. They [Crystal River] have delivered more than we expected, using the best cutting-edge technologies.
"The biggest problem with VPN solutions is that you, as a company, are dependant on someone else`s network. If they have a virus outbreak, network outage or any disaster-type scenario, you are going to be seriously affected. Then they still have to give you your guaranteed bandwidth, which you cannot monitor, so the SLA is worthless," says Doron Shmaryahu, chief ISP/WAN engineer at Crystal River.
"With the technology out there today, there are better, more cost-effective and reliable ways for a company to have a local WAN. VPNs are only really useful for international links. There are cases where a local VPN is useful, but that needs to be measured on merit. The best is to put down a Peribit on either side of the Diginet."
"For Sharp, we designed the e-mail infrastructure to minimise unnecessary use of the Diginet links as far as possible. We built and deployed Unix-based e-mail servers at each site. This enabled local mail to remain local and only mail that was destined outside of the branch would use bandwidth," says Shmaryahu.
"Of course, a virus outbreak can destroy a network so there is anti-virus built-in to the solution at every point as well as spam control which accounts for roughly 50% of all mail traffic."
"Our mail is fast, stable and highly reliable without any licence costs going forward. This was a major breakthrough for us. These guys delivered," says Steffens.
The next goal was to increase the bandwidth across the Diginet links without involving Telkom at all. The new Peribit device, which is cutting-edge technology, was used. The Peribit was able to dramatically increase the bandwidth over the physical line by up to three times depending on the application using the SR range.
Says Shmaryahu: "It`s not enough just to increase the bandwidth - you need to manage it. All too often companies just throw money at the problem by physically increasing the bandwidth or putting in some device, without realising where the real bottleneck is. Bandwidth is nice to have, but by itself it doesn`t solve the bottleneck issues. That`s what I like about the Peribit; it increases the bandwidth and lets you manage the QOS on one device. It is the most remarkable product I have seen. It can accelerate applications and reduce latency so it is perfect for Exchange, Terminal Server, Citrix, Notes, database applications, big image transports and print jobs across WANs."
"If you do have a VPN, a Peribit is a perfect match because not only can it give you all that extra bandwidth but it will also have the added benefit of providing you with bandwidth statistics to keep your ISP on track with the guaranteed bandwidth and the SLA that you pay for!" says Shmaryahu.
"Our application speed has at least doubled, our users are happy, the infrastructure is rock-solid, and the budget is intact," says Steffens.
"Peribit technology is going to change the face of WANs in SA," says Abraham.
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