Around 40 members of the Austin business community joined us at our cloud computing lunch and learn. The presentation discussed how cloud computing can bring business value to some companies and not to others.
Our audience was comprised of mostly business owners and they asked some excellent questions about cloud computing services. Below is a revised transcript of the Q&A session. The answers were supplied by our COO, Bill McCharen. Enjoy!
1. Do cloud services essentially entail having your own server but instead it’s off site and managed by someone like MyITpros?
Typically, the decision to move to the cloud is more related to a business’ model than just the location of the server. There’s a lot more to it than the server location. Such as virtualization, utilization and cross-platform functionality. But basically you have the right idea.
2. Can you talk about servers and how age affects them? I know we laughed at eight year old servers but I don’t even know how old mine is.
The hardware manufacturer will only warrant a server up to a certain time. Typically it’s five years. We interpret that as the expected life span of the system. The longer you operate that server after warranty expiration, the greater the risk of it failing.
The greatest cost of a server failure is productivity loss from the employees. You’re better off in investing in new hardware or looking into having your data hosted in the cloud. We’re pretty adamant about keeping warranties on servers up-to-date but not so much on desktop warranties.
3. Where would my data be if I was using MyITpros cloud services?
One data center is in Kansas City, Missouri and the other is in Austin, Texas. If you want to see the facility, you can come to our premise and take a tour. Google will not even tell you if it’s in the United States. Probably because they have no idea where your data is.
4. How is cloud computing affected if the Internet goes down?
First of all, Austin has good internet connectivity. It’s affordable and reliable. Fast and reliable is key to quality cloud computing performance.
If you lose connectivity at the office, you can go home or to a Starbucks to continue working. You can work anywhere with Internet.
5. What if one data center goes down?
The data centers are synced in real time so if one goes down then your data can be brought back up from the other data center.
6. How do you add software?
You would have your own virtual server that you can download your software to and use on almost any device.
7. Is network hardware, like a router, still necessary with cloud computing?
Those still need to be on site to help with connectivity to the cloud.
For more technical and industry specific questions check out Cloud Computing Q&A -part 2.
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Lori Mankin, Marketing Coordinator
Our goal for this blog is to answer the questions you ask. If you have any questions about cloud solutions or any other topic please email me at [email protected]. To learn more about IT subscribe to our blog.
