Data center administrators tasked with migrating VMs to new hardware often face a complex, time-consuming process that is vulnerable to errors—errors that can prove to be costly. To ensure a smooth transition, it might seem intuitive that sticking to the same hardware vendor is the best bet, but we found that is not always the case. When we documented every step of the migration process between older Cisco UCS servers and two newer platforms, we found that migrating to a new Dell PowerEdge MX platform was faster and simpler than migrating to a new Cisco UCS X-Series platform.

In fact, migrating a three-node cluster from an older UCS platform to a modular Dell PowerEdge MX platform required 246 fewer administrator steps than migrating to a new Cisco UCS X-Series platform. In addition, we completed the entire Dell migration—from initial configuration through server deployment—2 hours and 21 minutes faster than the Cisco migration. Those two wins translate to a migration process that takes 57.3 percent less time and requires 58 percent fewer steps. That’s time and effort that administrators can spend working on new ways to further your business goals.

To learn more about our migration study, check out the report and infographic below.