Posted by Glen Hamilton on Wed, Nov 05, 2008 @ 02:01 PM
When I personally think of something that is redundant, I think of something, anything that has been overused or overdone, to the point where it has become a negative thing. As there are millions of things that can be deemed redundant I will forego them and simply get into the topic at hand: What is redundancy in data services and how is it a positive thing?
Redundancy in the data center industry is regarded as “computer or network system components, such as fans, hard disk drives, servers, operating systems, switches, and telecommunication links that are installed to back up primary resources in case they fail,” according to techtarget.com. In plainer terms, redundancy within the data services industry is considered being prepared for failure of any aspect of technology, and having the resources to secure that aspect. Ergo, in a company that specializes in bandwidth/internet connectivity experiences failure, if they have multiple providers to work around that failure, they are considered to be redundant for that aspect of technology.
One can clearly deduce that the more redundant a data center, the better it is for the consumer. New England Data Services (NEDS), of Waltham, can be considered a very redundant company with redundant bandwidth, air conditioning, power, routers, firewall, network equipment, as well as servers. For NEDS, if any one of these aspects were to fail, they have the capability to back them up, so the consumer suffers minimal to no outage or downtime.
As I did for my previous blog on Venture Capitalist vs. Angel Investors, I will add quick question segment for consumers to ask themselves when looking towards data management services:
- What services am I looking for when dealing with a data center?
- Are the companies I am looking at redundant in those services?
- Does the company fit my individual needs and will they provide the customer service I deserve?
- Which company offers the best service for the money I am paying?
- How will this company ultimately benefit me?
Posted by Max Baun on Thu, Aug 28, 2008 @ 02:33 PM
If you are a resident of the United States you probably have a social security number. It is a unique number that is a unique identifier. Nobody else in the
world has the same social security number as you. It allows organizations, to track certain information about you.
A MAC Address is basically the same thing, but for computer equipment. The MAC Address is the Media Access Control, which is a unique value assigned to computer hardware for identification purposes. Your network adapters (your Ethernet card and wireless) use MAC Addresses to give you access to certain networks. Most of the time college IT departments require the students to register their MAC Address to allow them access to the network. This way, they can help prevent strangers from getting on the college network. In addition, the college can monitor what is going and coming from the MAC Address to prevent illegal activity.
Using our social security number example, we can pretend that a social security card is like a network card in a computer. Every place we give our SS number to has our information. Likewise, wherever we register the MAC Address of our network card has all the information of our network card.
Despite its purpose of being a unique identifier, most hardware with a MAC address can be changed (MAC spoofing). For example, the MAC Address on an Xbox 360 can be changed relatively easily. This number contains 12 hexadecimal numbers separated in pairs by hyphens. Looking to see what the MAC Address for your network card is? Easy, just open the Command Prompt and type in ipconfig/all. Look to find the Physical Address (MAC Address) corresponding to your Ethernet adapter.