Latency (the amount of time it takes for a piece of data to get from one place to another) is important for any data transfer, which includes the data center network latency. This is the time it takes for server-to-server communication within a data center. High latency could be better because it will slow down your applications.

This article will examine how to best reduce network latency by looking at five common network issues and their solutions.

Why is Data Center Network Latency Important?

According to a new study, data center network latency outside Jakarta is higher than previous reports have found. The study, which is the first of its kind and scope, examined data traffic in more than 20 cities across Southeast Asia.

Regarding infrastructure, almost all major cities in Indonesia have been crossed by fiber optic cable networks. The problem is that sometimes tenants prefer to place their servers in Jakarta, which makes it difficult for data centers outside Jakarta to develop. A data center requires technology updates and human resource development, and everything is still centralized in Jakarta.

A representative from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), who oversaw the study’s design and analysis, noted that this increase in latency has contributed to a decline in e-commerce on the region’s online marketplaces. Another contributing factor to the fall was some large data centers’ recent increase in fees.

Data center network latency is an important aspect of any data center. Below are some brief definitions of latency and how it affects your organization.

Latency is one of the most important measurements in data centers. Latency refers to how long a packet travels from one point to another in a network. While latency is typically measured at the IP level, the measurement can be taken from any layer three devices (router, switch, etc.).

Jakarta is in the Middle of the Indonesia Region

Jakarta is in the middle of the Indonesia region. Because it’s a metropolis with a population of over 10 million people, it’s considered a hub for business in the Southeast Asian region. Because of this, many international companies have data centers there.

As the center of ICT in Indonesia, all communication networks both for connections within Indonesia and outside Indonesia (IX and IIX) are available in Jakarta. A group controls them with the most influential association, APJII. This condition may hinder other areas from developing, for example, Batam and its surroundings.

Many data center investors are withdrawing due to network availability problems they have to use in Indonesia. However, they can overcome this by creating a company and operating it in Indonesia. For example, Equinix.

Efficiency and Environmental Impact

Network latency will impact more energy usage if the ms ping gets bigger. If network latency can be reduced, energy use will be more efficient. You must know that data center energy contributes as much as 2% of total carbon emissions globally.

A low-latency data center network can reduce energy usage in the data center, thereby reducing the energy needed to power servers and other equipment. Inefficient data center networks with high latency can increase overall costs for a business or organization.

Network latency is a significant problem for data centers because it can cause errors in data transmission, which can interrupt services and affect user experience. Many data center managers face a crucial question: reducing latency while remaining efficient and environmentally friendly.

Read also: Green Computing Reduces Data Centers’ Carbon Footprint.

How to deal with high data center network latency?

Implementing strategies to reduce latency without compromising efficiency or environmental impact is crucial because reducing latency can save companies money by reducing the number of servers and hardware needed in the data center. This strategy also enables IT departments to be more competitive by providing faster response times and improving customer satisfaction. Organizations that adopt low-latency technologies can attract new customers, retain old ones, and strengthen their market reputation.

Many factors contribute to latency, including geographic location, network distance between endpoints, the number of hops involved in the path from one endpoint to another, and the quality of networks connecting them.

To reduce latency, data center managers should:

  • Choose your data center location using a holistic approach.
  • Monitor latencies within the data center.
  • Create low-latency networks between racks in the data center.
  • Install fiber optic cable that is capable of low latency.
  • Use proper technologies.
  • Cooperate with all Internet Service Providers. This is important, especially if you are operating a carrier-neutral data center.

Once the traffic enters the facility, there are two primary points at which congestion occurs: at the network’s core and the access layer.

  • The network’s core should be provisioned for adequate capacity to avoid congestion, which can contribute to high latency.
  • Administrators can employ technologies such as DWDM (Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing) at the access layer.

DWDM allows many wavelengths of light to be bundled into one fiber strand, increasing capacity and reducing congestion by providing more bandwidth for clients to share. Reducing latency isn’t just about improving end-user response times; it’s also about effectively utilizing network resources to maintain high performance while using fewer resources.

Another option is rerouting traffic on your network. While this doesn’t reduce latency directly, delivering traffic can significantly help. If you have two servers in different locations serving the same services and applications, reroute traffic through the one with lower latency instead of sending it out to both simultaneously.

The downside is that there must be some redundancy between these two locations to keep services up if one goes down. The benefit is that you will have much lower overall latency because there’s only 1 location through which clients have to communicate with your network instead of 2 or more.

Conclusion

With the advent of cloud computing and virtualization, business processes can be performed remotely from the end users. As a result, service providers have been moving their data centers to areas with lower electricity costs and cooler temperatures, such as Indonesia.

Generally speaking, lower latency translates into better performance. Lower latency allows for more efficient data transport across the network. The key word here is “efficient.” If latency is too low, performance can suffer as packets arrive faster than the devices can process on that network segment.

It’s more than just your network that needs to be fast. The response time of an application will depend on how fast your users’ computers are connected to the network, so you also need to make sure that your users have fast connections to the internet. That’s why it is important that your data center ISP can provide you with quality connectivity.

In Indonesia, most data centers are clustered in South Jakarta because of the cooler climate compared to other parts of the city. Due to their proximity to each other, South Jakarta has very low latency.

Read next: Why Will Green Data Centers Companies Win the Future?

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