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Category Archives for "Network World SDN"

What is MU-MIMO and Why is it essential for Wi-Fi6 and 6E?

The only thing techies love more than creating acronyms is the chance to create even longer ones. Such is the case with wireless acronym MIMO (multiple input, multiple output), which got some additional letters with the release of MU-MIMO a few years ago.As wireless standards evolved from 802.11ac (Wi-Fi 5) to 802.11ax (Wi-Fi 6), new features were added to MU-MIMO as well to improve speeds and efficiency, specifically in the number of streams it can support, as well as bidirectional functionality (uplink and downlink).What is MU-MIMO? MU-MIMO stands for multi-user, multiple input, multiple output, and represents a significant advance over single-user MIMO (SU-MIMO), which is generally referred to as MIMO. MIMO technology was created to help increase the number of simultaneous users a single access point can support. This was initially achieved by increasing the number of antennas on a wireless router.To read this article in full, please click here

Dell upgrades entry-level block storage array

Dell's newest entry-level block storage array is the PowerVault ME5 series, aimed at price-sensitive customers with a focus on ease of deployment and affordability.The array's predecessor, the PowerVault ME4, was released in 2018. So it was overdue for an upgrade – and Dell delivered.The ME5 features significant performance and capacity improvements compared to the ME4. Between the hardware and software upgrades, Dell says the PowerVault ME5 offers twice the performance, throughput, capacity and memory of the ME4. The ME5 has newer Xeon processors with twice as many cores as the ME4, and controller memory has been increased to 16GB per controller.To read this article in full, please click here

Dell upgrades entry-level block-storage array

Dell’s newest entry-level block-storage array is the PowerVault ME5 series, aimed at price-sensitive customers with a focus on ease of deployment and affordability.The array’s predecessor, the PowerVault ME4, was released in 2018. So it was overdue for an upgrade—and Dell delivered.The ME5 features significant performance and capacity improvements compared to the ME4. Between the hardware and software upgrades, Dell says the PowerVault ME5 offers twice the performance, throughput, capacity and memory of the ME4. The ME5 has newer Xeon processors with twice as many cores as the ME4, and controller memory has been increased to 16GB per controller.To read this article in full, please click here

5G connections to hit 1 billion this year, and will double by 2025

5G connections will represent one-fifth of all worldwide mobile connections as of this year, putting those connections above the 1 billion mark for the first time, and that number will double by 2025, according to the GSMA (GSM Association).The GSMA’s Mobile Economy Report, published Wednesday, also said that 5G penetration is moving faster than either of the two previous major generations of mobile networking technology — while neither 3G nor 4G topped 2.2% of mobile connections until more than a year and a half after their introduction, 5G has already accounted for 5.5% in that time frame.There are currently almost 200 live 5G networks in 70 different countries, according to the GSMA report, which credits high demand for the rapid pace of the rollout.To read this article in full, please click here

Growth of hybrid and multi-cloud demands new thinking about virtual networks.

Everyone in tech likely thinks they know what “cloud computing” and “networking” mean, but they’re probably wrong, and their misconceptions about the first topic color their view of the second. Yes, the cloud is dominating computing, but most stuff isn’t “moving to the cloud”. This subtle point is already changing how we think about networking.I’ve worked with the cloud from the first, and while there was a bit of “move this to the cloud” going on for server consolidation reasons, the overwhelming majority of stuff enterprises run in the cloud today isn’t an entire application at all. It’s the presentation layer of legacy data-center apps.Corporate transaction processing, data storage and retrieval, and analytics are all things that demand security and reliability. From the first, enterprise executives have been telling me that these activities aren’t going to move to the cloud because they believe that their requirements can’t be met, and the cost would be greater rather than lower. My work with them proves out that view. Despite all the hype about the economy of scale of the cloud providers, the fact is that most enterprises achieve economies close enough to those of the cloud that the difference wouldn’t Continue reading

MWC: Microsoft expands 5G, edge-network offerings through Azure

Microsoft announced a range of new carrier infrastructure offerings through Azure, including services for private 5G enterpise networks, at this week’s Mobile World Congress, in a move designed to bolster the company’s position as a partner to the telecom industry as 5G and edge computing deployments progess.To read this article in full, please click here

How 6 top SD-WAN and SASE vendors are evolving

As the COVID-19 pandemic drags on and continues to impact the way people work, SD-WAN vendors are responding by investing heavily in new capabilities that extend the enterprise edge to wherever workers happen to be—branches, campuses, home offices, co-working spaces, mobile, etc.The main thrust of this evolution in SD-WAN technology is the merger of networking and security functions into a single platform, which most vendors now call Secure Access Service Edge (SASE).Who’s selling SASE, and what do you get? SASE, a term coined by Gartner in 2019, converges SD-WAN with basic security offerings, including encryption, anti-malware, and firewalls, while adding advanced services, such as Next-Generation Firewall (NGFW), Firewall-as-a-Service (FWaaS), Data Leak Prevention (DLP), Secure Internet Gateway (SIG), and Zero Trust Network Access (ZTNA).To read this article in full, please click here

HPE lets you build integrated private 5G/Wi-Fi networks

HP Enterprise will offer private 5G equipment integrated with its Aruba Wi-Fi gear to provide the option of using the technology that best meets the various wireless demands within an enterprise.As the name implies, Private 5G gear supports private 5G networks, not as a replacement for but as complementary to Wi-Fi.HPE says 5G surpasses Wi-Fi in terms of wide-area coverage as well as speed, but Wi-Fi has the advantage when it comes to cost-effective indoor connectivity. So the hybrid network will automatically switch between 5G and Wi-Fi depending on need and use.The technology itself is an evolution of the HPE 5G Core Stack introduced in 2020, and which is open, cloud-native, and container-based. HPE has added two new features to the product: integration with Wi-Fi networks through use of its Aruba wireless technology, and the integration of 5G radio access network (RAN) equipment from third-party vendors to enable deploying a 5G core at customer sites.To read this article in full, please click here

Cisco IDs top 2022 security threats and what to do about them

2022 will be another busy year for enterprise incident responders as ransomware, supply chain and myriad zero-day attacks will continue to rise, according to Cisco's Talos security experts.To help address the threats, the Cisco Talos team used a blog and online presentation to detail steps enterprises can take to defend themselves against the growing field of bad actors and also to point out lessons learned from recent damaging exploits such as the Log4j vulnerability and Microsoft Exchange server zero-day threats.Once, zero-day attacks were typically launched by state actors against service providers, but those days are gone, wrote Nick Biasini head of outreach at Cisco Talos in a blog about the security landscape in 2022. Now new, less experienced combatants seek out a broader range of targets, using less surgical attacks. “This has led to more risky behavior than we’ve seen historically, without as much regard for collateral damage,” he wrote.To read this article in full, please click here

Zero trust requires clear architecture plans before changing core systems

Zero trust touches everything: identity, applications, networks, data, and devices. The best approach is not to change everything all at once. Instead, start with the big picture.In our research, we’ve found the most successful organizations dedicated the first phase of their zero-trust initiatives to working out an architecture. They didn’t rush into deploying solutions as though starting with a greenfield.Everyone else dove in fast, mixing the foundational work on zero trust with one or more of the knock-on efforts: rearchitecting networks, security, and data management; buying tools; forming implementation teams and setting them to work. All those things need to happen, of course, but with zero trust, it pays to do a lot more thinking about how all the pieces will fit together before undertaking the changes needed, either at the architectural level or in the tool set.To read this article in full, please click here

5G grabs 3G wireless frequencies, creating headaches for some enterprise cellular users

The end is near for 3G in the US, as AT&T prepares to shut down its network next week, with T-Mobile and Verizon to follow suit within the calendar year.It’s a changeover long in the making, according to experts. The carriers, facing a spectrum shortage, have wanted to reuse 3G spectrum for newer-generation network technology for years, and the shortfall has only gotten worse as 5G begins to roll out. Verizon stopped supporting new 3G devices in 2018, and pushed back a planned 2019 3G shutdown until the end of 2022, according to IDC research manager Jason Leigh.To read this article in full, please click here

Data-center network automation: Its pitfalls and how to avoid them

(Enterprise Management Associates has published “The Future of Data Center Network Automation” based on a survey of enterprises, cloud providers and network service providers. This article by EMA Vice President of Research Networking Shamus McGillicuddy details some of its major findings.)More than 86% of companies expect their budgets for data-center network automation to increase over the next two years, and with spending ramping up, network teams need to plan carefully. Network automation is notoriously difficult to implement due to the complexity of networks in general, and only 23% of the people surveyed were fully confident in their data-center network-automation strategies.To read this article in full, please click here

Top 7 next-generation firewall vendors

With more employees accessing network resources remotely, the increase in companies deploying hybrid cloud architectures, and the overall escalation of security threats, firewall technology is critical to the integrity, security and the very lifeblood of any enterprise.  Traditional firewalls are security devices which inspect traffic at the point of network ingress/egress, as well as provide Virtual Private Network (VPN) and encryption capabilities. Firewalls watch traffic by state, port and protocol, and control the flow of the traffic passing through. In a traditional firewall, advanced security features are typically provided by external appliances and services that live outside the firewall platform.To read this article in full, please click here

Using the Linux host command to dig out DNS details

The host command on Linux systems can look up a variety of information available through the Domain Name System (DNS). It can find a host name if given an IP address or an IP address if given a host name plus a lot of other interesting details on systems and internet domains.The first query below tells us that the system associated with the address 192.168.0.18 is named “dragonfly”. The second tells us that 192.168.0.1 is the default router.$ host 192.168.0.18 18.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa domain name pointer dragonfly. $ host 192.168.0.1 1.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa domain name pointer router. To do the reverse, you can use commands like these:To read this article in full, please click here

Cisco faces a $14B backlog thanks to component scarcity

Cisco, like many of its competitors, has found increased revenue from pent-up demand, but chip shortages and other supply constraints continue to loom large over the industry.“We remain one of the largest software companies in the world,” Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins told investment analysts on an earnings call for its fiscal second quarter ended in January. "In Q2, our software revenue grew by 6% to $3.8 billion, total subscription revenue accelerated to $5.5 billion, up 7% year over year."To read this article in full, please click here

Podcast: Why is data center efficiency important? How to address emissions concerns

Data centers are a critical, but often power-hungry, part of the enterprise. But, why exactly do data centers require so much energy? And how can businesses address emissions concerns as well as cut back on the costs associated with cooling data centers? Ashish Nadkarni, group vice president within IDC's Worldwide Infrastructure Practice, joins Juliet to discuss the status of data center efficiency, what it means within the context of green IT and how technology has advanced to make servers more efficient. To read this article in full, please click here

F5 integrates security for multi-cloud app protection.

F5 Networks has rolled out an integrated, cloud-based security platform and services aimed at protecting widely distributed enterprise applications.The company used its Agility conference this week to introduce its overarching Distributed Cloud Services platform, which will bring together security technologies from recent acquisitions, including Threat Stack, Volterra, and Shape Security, plus its own web-application firewall and other components to offer an integrated, secure, distributed application-management platform for on-prem or cloud deployment.How to build a hybrid-cloud strategy “Modernizing apps includes transformational actions such as leveraging microservices, using multiple clouds and edge locations instead of a single cloud provider, and utilizing API-based communication to connect workloads and data,” wrote Haiyan Song, executive vice president and general manager of F5’s Security & Distributed Cloud Product Group in a blog about the new services.To read this article in full, please click here

Major security vulnerability found in top servers

Security firm Binarly has discovered more than 20 vulnerabilities hiding in BIOS/UEFI software from a wide range of system vendors, including Intel, Microsoft, Lenovo, Dell, Fujitsu, HP, HPE, Siemens, and Bull Atos.Binarly found the issues were associated with the use of InsydeH20, a framework code used to build motherboard unified extensible firmware interfaces (UEFI), the interface between a computer’s operating system and firmware.[Get regularly scheduled insights by signing up for Network World newsletters.] All of the aforementioned vendors used Insyde’s firmware SDK for motherboard development. It is expected that similar types of vulnerabilities exist in other in-house and third-party BIOS-vendor products as well.To read this article in full, please click here

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