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IT infrastructure and smart appliances specialist Lantronix announced the launch of its SLC 8000 modular console manager.
Designed to reduce deployment and management costs and time by providing secure, centralized, out-of-band management to most IT equipment, the SLC 8000 can be expanded from eight to 48 ports.
In a typical deployment, each port would manage one piece of IT equipment such as a switch, router or server, the company noted.
“Enterprises of all sizes have multiple sites and distributed IT infrastructure,” Vishal Kakkad, director of product marketing at Lantronix, told eWEEK. “Remote monitoring of the distributed infrastructure enables IT organizations to proactively address issues that might arise at these remote sites without requiring dedicated IT personnel on-site or deploying IT personnel to the remote site.”
Avoiding costly downtime, loss of productivity and in some cases loss in quality of customer experience are all important goals that remote monitoring helps to achieve.
The SLC 8000 modular console manager provides in-band and out-of-band management that allows IT personnel to centrally manage, monitor and troubleshoot IT equipment locally or from anywhere over the Internet.
An optional dial-up modem or cellular gateway is also available to provide connectivity if the network is down.
The modular design of the SLC 8000 console manager is scalable, allowing users to add or replace modules as needed.
“Modularity enables the IT organization to scale and grow their deployment of IT management infrastructure instead of performing fork lift upgrades as their needs grow,” Kakkad explained. “With a diversity of IT management interfaces–serial or USB–modularity helps customers build their preferred deployment configuration, Modularity enables organizations to make capital expenditures on as-needed basis without overprovisioning up-front.”
The appliance also includes security features such as SSL and SSH for data encryption, in addition to remote authentication for integration with other systems already in place.
The SLC 8000 is available worldwide for preorder through the company’s Website, starting at $1,530 for an eight port model with a single AC power supply.
Higher port and power supply configurations are also available, and the SLC 8000 will be available in limited quantities during the fourth quarter of 2014 through the company’s network of distribution channels and reseller partners.
The appliance also provides enhanced security with FIPS 140-2 compliant mode, minimizes cable clutter with software-reversible device port pins, enables “mix-and-match” with USB and RJ45 I/O modules, and supports secure authentication protocols including RADIUS, LDAP, TACACS+, Kerberos and Active Directory.
Kakkad also noted mobility represents a huge shift that enables the IT organization to get anytime, anywhere access to the remotely deployed IT infrastructure.
“With the ability to access the remote devices via the Web browser or dedicated applications for terminal access on the phone or tablet, and getting notified about alarm conditions via email, IT administrators now have the tools and capabilities to monitor and troubleshoot their remote infrastructure from anywhere,” he said. “Using standard Web protocols and secure Internet protocols, Lantronix makes it possible to manage IT infrastructure via mobile interfaces.”