The new RiOS Services Platform (RSP) provides customers with the capability to run additional services and applications in a protected partition on the Steelhead appliance. This revolutionary approach allows customers to deploy best-of-breed software at the edge without the need to deploy a full-blown server. This minimizes the hardware infrastructure footprint at the branch office enabling companies to consolidate IT even further, reducing costs and simplifying administration.

IT Consolidation - Phase 2

Organizations have implemented IT infrastructure consolidation measures in droves to reap many of the well-known benefits: simplified management, lower costs, and improved data protection and resource utilization. Despite best efforts, there have always been servers and applications that could not be centralized due to the need for localized resources.

Local print, DNS, and DHCP servers, for example, have been mainstays of the branch office regardless of the best consolidation efforts. The RSP now allows organizations to run these services on the Steelhead appliance, so organizations can consolidate more servers to reduce hardware, software, and maintenance costs.

The benefits of the RiOS Services platform include:

• Further consolidate IT in branch offices
• Reduce branch hardware footprint
• Run multiple branch services on Steelheads
• Simplify administration

The RSP runs in a protected zone and does not impact the resource allocations dedicated to maintain peak Steelhead operations. Currently, modules for print, core network services, and video streaming can be run on the RSP.

Core Network Services

Future capabilities such as IP Address Management will be provided by Infoblox. Infoblox NIOS™ software delivers nonstop core network services – including DNS, DHCP, IPAM, RADIUS, TFTP, NTP and others – that are critical to the operation of all IP-based networks. Delivery of these services on the Steelhead appliance provides local services with centralized management and allows for additional server consolidation. Infoblox NIOS software can be into unified grids that provide unparalleled management, control, visibility, and service resiliency.

In future releases, the following modules may also be added:

• Unified Threat Management (UTM)
• Authentication Services (ie. Active Directory)
• Application Performance Monitoring
• Virtual Machines

Learn more about how Riverbed can reduce bandwidth utilization for video streaming with Wowza and Qumu. Read the Solution Brief.