Chapter 1
Introduction
Over the past few years, deregulation and privatization have created intense competition in the worldwide telecommunications market. The marketplace has continued to evolve as voice and data solutions become more integrated and next-generation wireless, video, and messaging technologies emerge. The growing demand for scalable and available services, coupled with modern economic realities, is re-shaping the design of the telecom- munications infrastructure. Now more than ever, availability of key services—with stringent service-level agree- ments increasingly common—dictates success or failure. At the same time, today’s challenging economic climate means that successful organizations must continue to consider total cost of ownership (TCO).
Sun understands that Telecom companies have critical performance, reliability, stability, security, scalability, and manageability requirements. To meet these needs, Sun offers the Netra™ 240 server. NEBS Level 3-certified (DC version) and ETSI-compliant, Netra 240 servers are designed to be affordable, yet retain high-performance functionality. Netra 240 servers run the proven Solaris™ Operating System and are compatible with the rest of Sun’s high-performance UltraSPARC® server family—providing the performance, scalability, and expandability necessary to help organizations respond to rapidly changing requirements. With dual processor support in a com- pact, rackmount enclosure, the Netra 240 server also addresses increasing demands for increased network band- width, more secure network transactions, and easier manageability.
Ultimately, high availability is the key consideration for many Telecom companies. The Netra 240 server incor- porates a comprehensive approach that considers people, processes, and technology. This white paper describes the Netra 240 server’s system architecture, along with key software components for enabling high availability through remote management and resource management, and key services that further enhance Telecom applica- tion availability.
Target Audience
The Sun Netra product line, which includes the Netra 240 server, is ideal for a wide range of applications and users in the telecommunications industry as shown in Figure 1-1 on the following page. In addition to the telecommuni- cations industry, Netra 240 servers (both AC and DC versions) are ideal for industries including defense/military, manufacturing, utilities, financial services, and service providers.
Network Equipment Providers (NEPs)
NEPs look for simple, reliable, rack-efficient systems based on open standards that allow them to take advantage of Java technology, which eases new application development. Rugged NEBS Level 3-certified Netra products (DC