Improved performance and stability
Load balancing or a server cluster allow you to achieve optimal performance and high availability for your web-based applications. At PlusServer we offer load balancing via an external hardware interface. This can either be dedicated or an economical shared version.
The PlusServer Dedicated Load Balancer product ensures the secure, reliable and fast provision of your applications and content. Users and connections on your system, e.g. your web server, are distributed intelligently, dynamically, and dependent on the situation via an external interface. This means you alone use the physical resources of the dedicated load balancer. This ensures maximum performance and data throughput.
Characteristics
- Next generation load distribution services for companies that really value reliability and dynamics
- Suitable for environments with high demands on throughput and performance
Highlights
- Operation of a Dedicated Load Balancer solution by PlusServer
- Optional redundant design for maximum availability
- Continuous updating and immediate replacement of defective hardware
- Customer-specific load balancing policy
With a Shared or Business load balancer, you can provide your applications and content securely, reliably and with high performance. You also benefit from extremely attractive conditions due to the shared use of physical resources. As an external interface, the load balancer ensures that all system requests are shared across all resources intelligently, dynamically and dependent on the situation.
Characteristics
- Suitable for organisations looking for faster, more reliable and more efficient access to resources
- Good value for money
- The Business Load Balancer offers higher bandwidths, as well as usage that is strictly and consistently shielded from other customers
Highlights
- Operation of a Shared/Business load balancer solution by PlusServer
- Redundant design of the underlying infrastructure for maximum availability
- Can be flexibly expanded in terms of performance at any time
- Continuous updating and immediate replacement of defective hardware
- Customer-specific load balancing
Shared Switching
With switching products for the individual environment: Using VLANs, you can group your environment and customise it in line with your security and data throughput requirements. Shared Switching is obligatory for public networks with traffic up to 100 Mbit/s included. The bandwidth and application are each planned individually.
As a result, virtual LAN segments are possible for various scenarios: Uplink, DMZ, private, storage, backup. The bandwidths vary from host to host from 100 Mbit/s to 10 Gbit/s. You can also equip the shared switching redundantly or supplement it with VLAN trunking.
Highlights
- Increased security at ethernet level
- Assignment of IP networks in line with RIPE guidelines
- Predictable bandwidths per port from 100 Mbit/s to 10 Gbit/s
- Optional redundant switching paths (n+1) possible
- Internal traffic within the PlusServer backbone free of charge
- External traffic of 100 Mbit/s free of charge
- Optional VLAN trunking
- Compatible bandwidths with other shared products
What is load balancing?
Load balancing or a server cluster come into use when several servers handle one and the same thing. This is often referred to as a server farm. The advantage of this type of group is that the queries (load) can be divided up over the available resources. This means that queries are generally answered more quickly and with greater reliability.
In addition, all services will remain available when a server undergoes maintenance or fails. In this case, the load balancer simply redirects all queries to another server. A load balancer, therefore, does not simply improve performance, it also increases the high availability of your setup.
Load balancer tasks
- Permanent monitoring of available servers
- Distribute incoming queries to the servers based on the default method (e.g. round robin, least connections)
- For dynamic pages: forward requests from users who have already started a session to the same server
Load balancing vs. clustering
Both terms are generally associated with high availability, but how exactly do the models differ?
In load balancing, it does not matter how the infrastructure behind the load balancer is obtained. The servers to which the requests are distributed do not necessarily need to communicate with one another. In this case, the load balancer takes on the server status request.
By contrast, a cluster is characterised by the fact that the systems involved share their resources with one another to work towards a common goal. The status of other systems is known to each system. A typical example would be two web servers that access a joint database server.
Do you need a high-availability solution? Do you always want to offer your customers the best level of service? We are happy to help you determine your optimal server cluster setup.
