COMPUTING
Data Sheet
Centellis ® Virtualization Platform
An open hardware and software platform for implementing virtualized applications
Artesyn’s Centellis
®Virtualization Platform is an application virtualization hardware/software platform architected for next generation networks based on OpenFlow for Software Defined Networking (SDN) and OpenStack for Network Functions Virtualization (NFV). The platform enables service providers to run multiple virtualized applications such as firewall, DPI, security, or session border controller on a single hardware platform saving both capital expense and operating expense by eliminating the need for multiple application-specific hardware platforms.
Load-balanced switching provides additional efficiencies to virtual application deployment.
Artesyn’s Centellis Virtualization Platform is based on open hardware and software architectures and is carrier-grade and NEBS certifiable.
Key Benefits:
Software framework based on industry standard OpenFlow and OpenStack software stacks ensures interoperability and a multi-vendor ecosystem of Virtual Network Functions (VNFs)
Implementation of the Intel
®Accelerated DPDK ensures performance is optimized for the hardware and virtualized environment
Open ATCA hardware architecture ensures a multi-vendor payload ecosystem combined with the scalability and maintainability of a bladed architecture
Up to 160Gb/sec server interconnect provides the bandwidth required for line-rate application processing
Centellis VP provides the hardware and software platform to deploy carrier grade virtualized applications.
Application virtualization software framework based on industry standard SDN & NFV software stacks
Optimized performance utilizing the Intel
®Accelerated DPDK
Widely deployed and multi-vendor bladed hardware architecture for scalability and maintainability
Carrier grade platform with NEBS certification services available
Up to 12 dual-processor server
blades based on Intel
®Xeon
®E5-2600 V3
Centellis VP Diagram
Software Environment
SDN/NFV FRAMEWORK
Software Virtualization Framework based on industry standard SDN & NFV software stacks
•
Growing multi-vendor ecosystem of Virtual Network Functions (VNFs) software packages
•
Dynamic system and network scaling as traffic needs change
•
Optimized performance for the underlying processing hardware, utilizing the Intel
®Accelerated DPDK
•
KVM Hypervisor to dynamically create and destroy VNFs based on traffic needs
LOAD BALANCING
Balance traffic to multiple AdvancedTCA
®blades for packet monitoring and processing
Maintain flow context and packet sequence
Fully transparent for external network elements
Separate traffic into application groups
Redundant 160G per switch external Ethernet connectivity
480Gbit/s internal bandwidth for packet processing
Hardware Environment
PLATFORM
Widely deployed and multi-vendor bladed hardware architecture for scalability and maintainability
Up to 12 payload server blades with dual Intel
®Xeon
®E5-2600 V2 processors and up to 512GB of memory per server blade
High-speed backplane interconnect with 40-160Gbps bandwidth to each server blade
2 to 4 high speed Ethernet switch blades with load balancing to reduce v-switch overhead and increase server efficiency
Open platform that allows user flexibility to add blades dedicated to an application such as DSP-based high density media transcoding
AC & DC versions available
High availability (5-nines) platform architected for NEBS certification
SERVER BLADES
Two Intel
®Xeon
®processors, E5-2600 v3 family with up to 14 cores per processor
Up to 512GB main memory, DDR4, configurable for highest capacity or cost effective memory configurations
Large scale on-board solid state storage
QuadStar™ 40G fabric interfaces enabling multiple bandwidth and redundancy options
Choice of network I/O options supporting 1, 10 and 40G interfaces
Hardware off-loading functions for en/decryption and compression (optional)
Hot-swappable mass storage options and RAID 0/1 support
Available open source and commercial Linux derivatives
System Management
System Services Framework (evaluation license included) provides an easy way to set up and manage an Artesyn platform with an attractive web browser-based graphical user interface, command line interface or XML interface.
Automated system inventory of hardware and system software elements
Platform monitoring and management including sensors, alarms, events, hotswap status, FRU information, power, cooling, and shelf management
Graphical monitoring of platform parameters including:
•
Several temperature readings
•
Voltage readings
•
Fan levels
Firmware upgrade for all blades
Linux OS services management
Configuration of SRStackware switch management and protocol software
Blade and systems diagnostics
Security and access control including system user account management and user authentication
Ability to integrate additional functionality through packages from Artesyn or 3rd parties
Centellis
®VP Use Case
As service providers continue to virtualize more and more applications, they can minimize total cost of ownership with a highly scalable and carrier-grade platform such as Artesyn’s Centellis
®VP. What used to take several dedicated appliances can now be achieved with a single system running multiple applications, significantly reducing both capital expense and operating expense.
These applications can be deployed with the hardware necessary for the current peak traffic load and easily scaled by adding more blades or more systems as traffic load increases.
Centellis VP is an ideal platform for deploying NFV Infrastructure (NFVI) nodes, containing high density compute resources, high bandwidth interconnectivity and in-system switching elements. The payload blades (compute resources, virtual switches) and Physical Switches contain the OpenFlow and OpenStack modules
necessary to manage the entire system as part of an SDN/NFV network.
OpenFlow and NETCONF provide the interface for an SDN controller to configure flows within both the Physical switch (ATCA-F140) and OpenVSwitch on all of the Payload blades.
OpenStack provides the interface for a controller to create, deploy and destroy application instances on the ATCA compute blades.
A typical service provider datacenter includes dedicated appliances for DPI, Load balancing, Firewall/Security Gateway, Data Analytics, as well as applications provided as a service to their subscribers (video transport, email, web services, etc.)
Hosting these services on dedicated appliances increases cost and
reduces flexibility – in terms of both the configuration of service
available, as well as the ability to scale services on demand.
Using Artesyn’s Centellis
®VP, a service provider can now run each of these applications on a single bladed system. The number and type of each application instance can be dynamically scaled depending on traffic load and subscriber growth
Efficient Service-chaining is made possible by running multiple functions as Virtual Network Functions (VNF) within the system. For example, a typical traffic flow may include DPI for traffic
classification, Application Specific Load Balancing, Firewall/Security gateway, then application specific functions for video, data
services, etc. Dynamic service chaining allows new services to be deployed without installing new appliances. Existing service chains can be re-configured automatically to respond to changing network conditions.
In Figure 2, traffic is ‘chained’ through a DPI VNF for traffic classification and load balancing, a Firewall VNF for security and then finally an Application Delivery Controller (ADC) to access a particular service.
Initial deployment sees the DPI and Firewall VNFs deployed on the same physical server, with Service Chaining implemented as a traffic flow configured within the Virtual Switch on that machine.
The Virtual switch routes traffic from the DPI VNF to the Firewall VNF and then onwards towards the ADC. As network demand grows, the DPI/Firewall chain can be split across multiple physical servers. The diagram shows the Firewall migrating to a new physical entity, leaving the DPI application to consume more of the original host’s CPU. Historically, this migration would have taken hours, if not days, of configuring a new server, re-cabling, updating local routing tables, etc. In a virtualized environment, the same effect can be achieved in seconds! Once a controller has
established a new Firewall service on the new machine, the flow tables on the original machine are reconfigured to direct traffic to the new server, instead of the old Firewall VNF.
Artesyn’s Centellis
®VP offers a great deal of flexibility and scalability. The number of severs within a system can be scaled and the number of systems in the data center can be scaled to meet the data traffic demands. Resources are automatically recognized as available by an SDN and NFV controller. Because the Virtualization Framework software is based on industry standard NFV stacks, virtual functions can be sourced from multiple vendors, avoiding application vendor lock and providing the best total cost of ownership.
Service Chaining in Centellis
®VP
VNFDPI Firewall VNF
Server
Firewall VNF
Server
WebVNF Video VNF
Server
Virtual Switch Virtual SwitchS
Physical Switch
Virtual Switch Virtual Switch
Dynamically scale to additional server as traffic increases
Video General Data
Figure 2: Dynamic Service Chaining in Centellis
®VP
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Centellis VP-DS 20Aug2015
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