Pros and Cons of Hybrid Cloud Architecture Approaches

Hybrid cloud architecture basically provides a conducive storage infrastructure for both on-premise (where it enables the users to store unstructured data from internet or devices) and off-premise (cloud) purposes that enables a flawless integration with the public cloud for cloud bursting, long-term data archiving and disaster retrieval in the most cost-effective and highly ascendible manner.

When considering how to acquire a hybrid cloud architecture, there are basically two approaches, building-it-yourself or get a prepackaged one. Based on the resources and time available criteria, an organization can choose either of the two approaches. Each approach has its pros and cons as analyzed below.

Option 1: Build-it-yourself Hybrid Cloud Architecture This approach requires an IT planner to select the object storage software autonomously from the hardware. In this case, the hardware is usually off-the-shelf, this includes commodity servers that can at times be remainders of a server consolidation effort.

Therefore, this approach compels the user to buy the storage device off-the-shelf. â—? Advantages The main pro of this approach is that it is very cost-effective compared to the prepackaged hybrid cloud architecture. Servers in the data center can be reused by members of the cloud storage infrastructure. It is, therefore, the best option for organizations that face tight budget constraints.

Another pro is that this approach is very flexible. The IT planner sets out the architecture in such a manner that most of the vendor hardware can be used in both the present time and future. This makes it a long-term asset to the organization. â—? Disadvantages The major drawback of this approach is the time it consumes. The process of identifying and feasibility testing of all the servers and storage to be used in the cloud infrastructure consumes a lot of time. In this case, the more complex the cloud infrastructure is the more time it consumes. This approach would, therefore, not be very attractive to organizations that have no much time on their side to undertake the process of building the cloud architecture.

Option 2: Prepackaged Hybrid Cloud Architecture This approach is very similar to the build-it-yourself approach but on its case, the vendor needs to install cloud storage software to the commodity hardware after the integration work. When the vendor server is usually a server vendor, however, the cloud architecture will customarily use its name-brand equipment.

● Advantages The main pro of this approach is usually the time value. This system can be ordered and start writing data on it within a very short period of time. It is, therefore, more preferable to organizations that are constrained by time. ● Disadvantages Vendors charge for their services, that is, pre-configuration of the system and, therefore, making this approach more expensive compared to the make-it-yourself approach. This makes the prepackaged hybrid cloud architecture less suitable to organizations that have a tight budget constraint, but it still suits organizations that are competing against time.

It is evident that the choice between building a hybrid cloud architecture for yourself and purchasing prepackaged hybrid cloud architecture is informed by consideration of time saved and cost saved which results to a trade-off between time and cost. The decision on which a data center uses will hence be highly influenced by, the IT's deployed, skills and time.

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