Hardware Clouds--Pros and Cons - Essay Example

The trends in cloud computing suggest that cloud computing has more to do with software side than the hardware side. However, it is generally argued that the hardware demand will ultimately increase as a result of cloud computing and hardware clouds will be as common as software clouds are. (Cervone, 2010)Over the period of time, trends have emerged suggesting the companies are increasingly requiring hardware as clouds to support their extensive I.T. requirements. As such the cloud computing becomes more beneficial in following ways:1.

Hardware cloud becomes more important and beneficial where firms tend to save on their own investment. Traditionally, clouds only support the software services wherein the hardware component is provided by the end users. However, due to increasing complexity of the technology as well as changing requirements, it becomes more costly and beneficial for the firms to also use hardware clouds. Apart from this, hardware clouds can help organizations to save costs on infrastructure development, construction costs as well as energy savings.

(Low, Chen, & Wu, 2011)2. The portability of the hardware clouds wherein firms offer hardware cloud servers packed in containers and can be plugged even from parking lots suggests that the companies can take advantage of the portability offered by hardware clouds. 3. Hardware clouds are completely scalable in nature therefore organizations can actually tailor them according to their own requirements. Off-the-shelf hardware often cannot fulfill the exact requirements of the organizations however, due to scalability of the hardware cloud, it offers a viable alternative to gain access to hardware tailored exactly according to the requirements.

Though the above benefits of hardware cloud computing can be sufficient enough to allow firms to go for such organizational shift in terms of managing information technology resources however, hardware clouds may not fulfill all the requirements of the companies. Hardware clouds may not be beneficial under following conditions:1. One of the key areas where hardware cloud can fail to provide results is the issue of performance. Especially on the public clouds, many organizations may be sharing the same hardware therefore the performance may slow down.

Further, even with the dedicated hardware, extra load on the hardware can slow the execution of processes and thus result into loss of efficiency. (Sharif, 2010)2. Single hardware clouds function in single point therefore the failure of the hardware can shut down all the information technology resources of any organization. It is therefore important to develop either in-house alternative sites or rely on other providers in case of any disaster.3. Organizations looking for extensive customization may not be able to gain complete benefits from hardware clouds.

Though hardware clouds are scalable in nature however, they are not truly flexible in nature and may not provide the maximum required level of customization desired by the organization.The above discussion therefore suggests that hardware clouds may not be optimal in the sense that overall risk of failure is relatively large. The absence of data and hardware back-up may therefore create strong chances of sustaining losses by the organizations.BibliographyCervone, H. F. (2010). An overview of virtual and cloud computing.

CLC Systems & Services , 26 (3), 162 - 165.Low, C., Chen, Y., & Wu, M. (2011). Understanding the determinants of cloud computing adoption. Industrial Management & Data Systems , 111 (7), 1006 - 1023.Sharif, A. M. (2010). Its written in the cloud: the hype and promise of cloud computing. Journal of Enterprise Information Management , 23 (2), 131 - 134.