February 6, 2004

Co-Location Service—On and Off Site

Co-location services are available on-site (at the NIH data center) and off-site (in Northern Virginia). Customers' servers are housed in a secure, climate-controlled environment, where customers can control and access their own equipment. Co-location is an attractive option for customers who have already invested in servers but do not have a suitable server environment.

CIT offers customers flexibility by providing multiple hosting services for applications. Co-location services are offered in addition to traditional full-service hosting—that is, CIT-owned servers (OS/390, Unix, Windows servers) in the NIH Computer center.

Colocation Services

All hosting services—including co-location off and on-site—provide a secure environment for applications that includes physical security; redundant, high-bandwidth connectivity; reliable infrastructure (uninterruptible power supply, climate control); and operations staff on-site 24 x 7. Co-location services provide the standard environment available to full-service hosting, as well as:

-	video monitoring for extra security
-	24 x 7 access to your server
-	various space options for your servers
-	charging based on the amount of rack space needed (CIT can provide a full, or partial, standard-size rack for your use, or you can supply your own server racks.)

•       On-Site Co-Location

The Customer Server Area (CSA)—in a secure, separate part of the CIT data center—is dedicated to housing your servers in our highly reliable facility. The CSA provides floor space, fully redundant power, climate control, high-bandwidth connectivity, and security, as well as an additional card-key-controlled access door.

•       Off-Site Co-Location

For the first time, CIT is offering off-site co-location services to meet your growing needs. Your servers can be housed in a secure, off-site location connected by extremely high bandwidth—away from the NIH campus (in Northern Virginia), yet under the auspices of CIT. The off-site co-location still ensures the full confidentiality, availability, and integrity of NIH information. This off-campus location can be used to provide a highly reliable, secure backup location for your hosted applications and Web sites so that business can carry on as usual in the event of a disaster.

How Can I Learn More?

To learn more about these various options—co-location on site (at NIH), co-location off site, and full service hosting—please contact the TASC help desk at 301-594-6248, and ask to speak to the co-location staff, or send e-mail to datacenter@list.nih.gov.

Our staff looks forward to working with you to assess your hosting requirements and to help you determine the option that best meets the needs of your organization.