RackConnect™ is a unique solution designed for customers who require the flexibility and elasticity of the
cloud,
as well as the enhanced security and performance characteristics of traditional hosting – the best of both worlds.
In essence, RackConnect enables customers to realize the power of Hybrid Hosting
For Enterprise Businesses:
For Small and Mid-sized Businesses:
Enterprise businesses trust their mission-critical applications on highly available and high-performing traditional hosted infrastructure,
using products such as high-speed SAN storage, single-tenant virtualization, and high-capacity load balancers. RackConnect can enhance
this infrastructure with rapidly elastic cloud compute and storage resources, allowing you to flex your capacity at a moment’s notice,
reacting to unexpected spikes in demand or to seasonal business trends.
Customers with smaller dedicated hosting footprints can realize cost savings by shifting certain components of their application to a cloud platform,
such as the web or application tier. Moving image libraries to cloud storage, for example, reduces the dedicated storage requirements and allows
faster content distribution via the CDN capability of Cloud Files™.
For customers using Cloud Servers™, RackConnect allows you to add in a custom-built, high- performance database or app server to provide a more secure,
single-tenant backend for your app. Layer on a dedicated firewall, web app firewall, or DDoS mitigation to help protect your entire solution.
“We flicked the switch, and went almost immediately from having zero traffic to millions of hits.”
Watch Their Story
How RackConnect Works
- Choose an F5® BIG-IP® Local Traffic Manager or a Cisco® ASA firewall to connect your traditional hosted infrastructure to the Rackspace Cloud
- Cloud Servers can automatically be added to your load balancer, enabling you to scale on demand
- Connect to Rackspace with an encrypted VPN tunnel to link the Rackspace Cloud to your data center or existing IT infrastructure
- Define Network Security Policies in the customer portal and they are automatically applied and managed across your firewall, load balancer, and Cloud Servers
- Manage cloud and dedicated network security policies centrally in the MyRackspace© customer portal
- Add Cloud Files for easily scalable storage
Use Cases
The use cases below show you the true flexibility of the RackConnect solution, from simple configurations to true Enterprise scale.
These examples can help you solve the tradeoff between security requirements, performance, and cost.
- DEDICATED FIREWALL
FOR CLOUD SERVERS
- COST EFFECTIVE HYBRID
- VPN CLOUD
BURSTING EXAMPLE
- DEDICATED LOAD BALANCING
- ENTERPRISE HYBRID
Dedicated hardware firewall with Cloud Servers provides protection for the integrity of your data and safeguards against service interruptions.
Suitable Use Cases
- Add a firewall to your Cloud Servers deployment
- VPN to the cloud via site-to-site VPN
- Manage the security of your environment automatically from the customer portal
Dedicated firewall protecting your Cloud Servers, and a high-performance physical server for your database backend.
Suitable Use Cases
- Ecommerce Sites
- High traffic blogs
- Content management systems
- Database-driven web applications
Encrypted VPN tunnel creates a secure connection between your existing data center or IT infrastructure and the Rackspace Cloud.
- Extend your IT infrastructure to the Rackspace Cloud
- “Burst” extra compute requirements into the Rackspace Cloud
- Shift workloads to the cloud (OPEX) to free up valuable data center space
Suitable Use Cases
- Collaboration or messaging solutions, such as Microsoft SharePoint® and Microsoft Exchange®
- Secure administrator access to Cloud Servers via VPNs
- Test and development in the cloud
- Employ cloud as a data replication target
- Use the Rackspace Cloud as a target for your disaster recovery solution
Hardware-based, dedicated load balancer and dedicated firewall. Load balances dedicated and Cloud Servers together. Size your environment to your average capacity, and use utility-priced cloud to handle peak traffic needs. Cloud Servers can be automatically added to your load balancer, allowing you to scale on demand.
Suitable Use Cases
- Unpredictable traffic
- Marketing campaigns
- Rich media
- Seasonal traffic apps, such as ecommerce applications
Highly available solution for large, complex configurations.
- High-speed dedicated storage
- VMware-based Private Cloud
- Multiple security layers
- Meets various levels of performance needs
Suitable Use Cases
- Mission critical deployments requiring multiple levels of redundancy
- Complex enterprise applications with specific technology requirements