Ultimate
Performance and Reliability!
Atlanta Virtual recognizes that
downtime is not an option for our client's servers.
That's why we invest heavily in hardware and facilities
that ensure that our clients, and your clients are
up and running on the web 24 hours a day, seven days
a week. |
Industrial-Grade Equipment for
the Ultimate Performance and Reliability
Atlanta Virtual recognizes that downtime is not an option
for your servers. That's why we invest heavily in hardware
and facilities that ensure that your clients are up and
running on the web 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Atlanta Virtual's Network Operations Center (NOC) features
raised flooring. This enables a constant flow of conditioned
air and helps to maintain uniform room temperature at
all times. In addition, raised flooring reduces static
and ensures a professional, computer-grade environment
for your servers.
The facility is equipped with a Raytheon fire suppression
system, designed to immediately extinguish fire and protect
equipment and personnel. The command center is controlled
via automatic doors to further secure and protect the
equipment.
Finally, the NOC is located in a secure, monitored, class
A building with a minimum number of approved personnel
allowed access to highly sensitive areas and equipment.
A detailed record of employee and visitor entry is maintained
at all times.
Uninterruptible Power System
To guard against local power failures, Atlanta Virtual
has two industrial-grade, three-phase Liebert UPS systems.
These act as back-up batteries, maintaining uninterrupted
power in case of surges or power outages. With these back-up
systems in place, we can keep our network up and running
indefinitely without relying on external power.
Industrial-Grade Air Conditioners
Atlanta Virtual's NOC is backed by two Liebert 10 ton
industrial air conditioners that condition our computer
rooms and operations center. Air temperature is maintained
at an optimal 65 degrees Fahrenheit.
Custom Web Servers
Atlanta Virtual's web servers are custom-built industrial
machines designed for a 24/7 web serving environment.
All Atlanta Virtual servers are equipped with dual-redundant,
450-watt power supplies, hot swap Seagate Baracuda/Cheetah
drives and force-filtered cooling systems. In addition,
our NOC is equipped with an inventory of identically configured,
burned-in standby servers.
Force Filtered Cooling
All of Atlanta Virtual's custom web servers are equipped
with a positive-pressure filtered-air system. Four large
fans pull filtered air into each server's protective case,
and the components within are cooled by fans that circulate
this purified air. This constant introduction of clean
air into the case creates a positive pressure environment
ensuring that dust and particles remain outside the server.
Hot Swap Seagate Drives
The drives and drive bays of all Atlanta Virtual servers
are constructed from high-grade aluminum and rest in shock-mounted
drive cages, which adds to the durability of the hardware.
Atlanta Virtual's drives proudly feature the lowest failure
rate in the industry.
Redundant Hot Swap Power Supplies
Each server employs dual-redundant hot swap power supplies.
If a power supply were to fail, the server would continue
running with power from the alternate supply. Meanwhile,
alarms would alert a technician, who would quickly restore
redundancy. In the meantime, servers and client sites
would experience no downtime.
Standby Servers
We keep spare servers online of all CPU configurations.
If a server were to experience a hardware failure, we
would turn a key, grab the handle on the drive, pull it
out and insert it into an identical standby CPU. We would
then reboot the second machine, and the server would be
up and running again in a matter of minutes.
Connected to Three Backbones
The Atlanta Virtual NOC, located in Baltimore, Maryland,
is OnNet with GlobalCenter (GC), Qwest Communications
and GTE through three separate bandwidth-on-demand connections
that enter Baltimore in our building.
GC, a Tier 1 provider with a 13,000-mile fiber optic
network and Dense Wave Division Multiplexing (DWDM) technology
that provides an enormous 460 gigabytes per second (Gbps)
of capacity worldwide, has an Asynchronous Transfer Mode
(ATM) fiber node located just a few floors below the Atlanta
Virtual NOC.
Qwest comes into Baltimore with an OC-12 line and plans
to upgrade its connection to an OC-48 in the near future.
Qwest also has an ATM fiber node just floors below the
Atlanta Virtual NOC. Our Qwest connection enables Atlanta
Virtual to offer additional redundancy and better routes
to Europe, Latin America and Asia. With our carriers,
our router has up to 150,000 possible routes to send each
packet of traffic.
Genuity, a division of GTE, is our third Tier One Internet
backbone. Genuity provides excellent network performance
as a result of high-speed peering arrangements with other
Tier One Internet backbone providers. The GTE global network
delivers customers directly onto the Internet via a high-speed
connection to its private, super-capacity backbone, including
17,000 miles of fiber and OC192 capacity. It is comprised
of more than 800 U.S. local access points and approximately
1,500 international local access points in more than 150
countries.
Furthermore, because of these unique connections, Atlanta
Virtual does not need to link to the Internet through
an OC3 or T3 Telecom circuit. Instead, independent cables
run inside our building directly from the Atlanta Virtual
NOC to all three carriers' points of presence. These lines
can handle the bandwidth of a T3 or an OC3 with DWDM.
Plus, they handle several times the bandwidth of an OC3.
Whatever your bandwidth needs may be, Atlanta Virtual
has the scalability to meet them.
Network Redundancy
Atlanta Virtual uses intelligent end-user routing software
called Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) between Qwest, GC
and GTE, which use the same protocol. BGP identifies which
path is the most efficient for each data packet and then
routes the packet to its destination on the fastest path.
This increases the speed at which web pages sent from
our NOC arrive at their destination.
Studies have shown that the most common reason for downtime
is circuit failure on Tier 1 provider backbones, the major
data highways. To guard against this potential problem,
we have three Tier-1 providers. If one experiences problems,
we can route traffic down another one. Furthermore, because
we are OnNet with GlobalCenter, Qwest and GTE, we share
their digital distribution architecture, which includes
private peering network connections to major Internet
carriers such as MCI, Sprint, UUNET, EUNET, AT&T,
AOL, Best, Erols, @Home, IBM Advantis and others. These
private peering arrangements allow Atlanta Virtual to
quickly and efficiently exchange packets of data with
every major backbone carrier in a one-to-one environment.
In addition, GC has high-speed links to eight public
exchanges including both MAE East and West and several
NAPS. Through these public exchanges, customers have the
ability to reach their sites, no matter where they are.
Network Reliability
Industry analysis reveals that 70% of downtime of over
10 hours with any ISP is caused by telephone circuit failure.
With Atlanta Virtual, circuit failure is virtually eliminated.
That's because our NOC is in the same building as GlobalCenter,
Qwest and GTE. There is no phone circuit between Atlanta
Virtual and these providers. Instead, there is a direct
connection between our Cisco 7500 routers and theirs.
Atlanta Virtual's providers also have peering connections
with other major Tier 1 providers that allow traffic to
be switched to alternate backbones should the need arise.
Raw Performance Equals Low Latency/High Throughput
Too often providers operate their networks at three to
four times their responsible capacity. As a result, their
corresponding transfer times reach over 300ms. Atlanta
Virtual's network daily average is 27% of its capacity,
with midday peak spikes reaching only 33% capacity. Atlanta
Virtual guarantees that clients will be carried off our
network in less than 80ms over a five-minute average at
any time of day or night.
Get started today ... call to speak to one of our sales
team representatives (toll-free) at 1.770.629.6550 or
Contact Us