Item: Scale Computing Platform
Rating: 8
Author: Nicholas Hempenius

Overall Satisfaction with Scale Computing HC3

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We have a six blade Scale cluster that supports our 20+ servers that are essential in providing the back-end of the Hammock Source e-commerce presence. The servers also provide services to our shipping, receiving, and customer service departments. Our Scale VM cluster addresses our need for a large amount of servers within a limited amount of space. It also allows for business expansion that is continuously going on.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Scale Computing provides a simple and easy to use graphical interface.
The VM export feature makes it easy to backup VM images to remote storage servers without having to use external tools.
Resource allocation to various VMs is easy and seamless using the graphical interface.

Cons

The VM Disk usage meter seems to be broken, we have an in house work around to track this.
The cluster logs could provide a little more feedback and be more verbose.
Automating VM export would also be extreamly helpful.

Support Rating

I have only had one interaction with scale support, however it was a great interaction and was helped quickly. Great support team.

Return on Investment

I know that it has reduced management need of over 20+ servers to only two individuals.

Alternatives Considered

This was determined prior to me joining the company. However, I do know that the previous solution was an IBM blade server with VMware. I know that Scale is more effective and user-friendly than VMware.

Likelihood to Recommend

A great scenario where Scale computing is almost perfect would be in class room type environment. I am a technical lead for the East Carolina University Collegiate Cyber defense competition, we need to have a lab environment with many different operating systems that can all communicate with each other so that we can practice cyber security techniques. With my experience in using the HC3 I feel that it would be a wonderful environment to practice cyber defense.

Comments

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Scale, keeping it simple and easy.