Expand Server Consolidation

Acceleration

Networked Applications Run the Business

Slow Applications Slow the Business

From tasks as simple as sending memos via email to tasks as complex as group collaboration on engineering and manufacturing plans, businesses increasingly rely on the use of networked applications. Point of sale applications allow customers to buy goods, ERP applications ensure manufacturing has the material they need, and accounting applications ensure accurate fund management. Almost all employees will use applications at one point or another in their job. Applications that run fast allow employees to be efficient and productive. On the other hand, applications that run slow (higher latency) will cause employees to be inefficient and will cause productivity to drop. While application performance at headquarters is usually good, the application performance at remote locations typically suffers. This higher latency, or application slow down, often prevents optimal productivity from employees in these remote locations (a real problem when more than 85% of the enterprise workforce is remote).

The Impact of Latency Can Be High at Remote Locations

Adding Bandwidth Does Not Solve the Problem

Over the past few years, with dropping network prices, it was tempting to add bandwidth to try and solve application problems on the WAN. But bandwidth is often not the answer. The problem is usually a bit more complicated … it is an issue of physics. Consider a completely clear 64 KB link traversing a distance of 10,000 kilometers (about the distance between Tokyo and New York). Under the best possible lab environment conditions (light traveling in a vacuum), a 1 KB packet would take a little more than 33 milliseconds to make the trip. What if the links' bandwidth is raised to 155 MB … how long would the same packet take to make the trip? Exactly the same 33 milliseconds. Why is this? The problem is not bandwidth, it is latency. The packet cannot travel faster than the speed of light. Simply adding more bandwidth will not improve the latency on the WAN link.

The reality is that average latency between Tokyo and New York is closer to 170 milliseconds … almost six times worse (real-world versus lab environments). Even so, a single 170 millisecond delay on application response may not sound so bad. Unfortunately, that is not the whole story. Most of the applications that run the business are fairly chatty. The number of roundtrips necessary to download a typical home page is in the hundreds, if not thousands. In the end, distance will contribute to latency, and even small increases in latency can dramatically impact the performance of applications. Adding more bandwidth will not improve performance in a significant way.

Mitigate the Effects of Latency

Parallelizing the Transport

With the current application technology, there is no way to increase the speed of light. This means there is no way to really reduce latency when distance is the issue. However, the Expand Acceleration solution is able to mitigate the effects of latency. This is accomplished via a deep understanding of the protocols applications use to communicate. Essentially, with this understanding, it is possible to implement techniques that will change the serial nature of application communication to a latency mitigating parallel nature. Include the intelligent use of caching and compression techniques, and the user experience improves substantially. Together, these optimizations will speed the response time of applications, directly improving the productivity of business.

Expand's Acceleration Solution

Application Acceleration

Expand's Application Acceleration solution is a collection of application-specific enhancements that improve response time. The collection includes HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, and DNS, that will all dramatically improve web services and other business applications running over the web. Expand's Citrix Acceleration has been a staple for many years, enabling more user sessions per remote location as well as speeding the response time across the board. Voice Optimization will help prevent congestion that impacts the call quality for IP calls, and the Terminal Services Acceleration will bring this application's WAN performance closer to what the LAN delivers.

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