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jamal wrote:
>
> I am not asking you to justify why LVS exists or why people should use
> LVS; i am just making a statement that load balancing h/ware is becoming
> commodity. If the trend continues, you should be able to buy a black box
> worth $200 which will have the same features as LVS does; perhaps i am
> exagerating a bit, but if this is the case, why should someone continue to
> use LVS? I was hoping you will enlighten me in some way instead you become
> defensive and give me a marketing pitch.
> Maybe someone else has an answer.
(Disregard for the moment that intelligent load balancers are not $200,
nor will they be in the near future. Try $2000 at the low end.)
I've got an excellent reason for LVS to exist. My company makes web
caches, and I love (absolutely adore!) the idea of popping one extra
(free!) package onto my boxes and removing the need for my clients to
spend the extra money (even IF their were load balancers available for
$200) to balance between multiple caches.
Also, don't forget that the administration of one box is easier than
that of two, especially when they use different operating systems.
Further, every box must be secured (even a load balancer needs some
security precautions). Every box takes up space. Every box requires
power. Every box costs money and time to install into the network.
If you put it into one box, you reduce those expenses.
I'm not saying everything under the sun ought to be crammed into one
box, but sometimes it just makes sense for certain functions to come
together. I don't see any reason why a single function web server
appliance or single function caching appliance shouldn't do its own load
balancing. It seems like a natural extension of a good idea.
Besides all that...every IT department has a few old Pentiums collecting
dust in the closet. Now they are perfect load balancers for a couple of
inhouse web or file servers. No new hardware. No requests to
management begging for more money. Just do it. Better network for no
more money. Management smiles, you get raise, everybody happy.
--
Joe Cooper <joe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Affordable Web Caching Proxy Appliances
http://www.swelltech.com
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