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ZXTM ensures Discshop�s customers don�t have to shop around
According to analyst firm Forrester in its Ecommerce 2006-2011 forecast, online retail sales in Europe will more than double in the next five years to �263 billion as the number of online shoppers grows to 174 million.
Online retailers face similar challenges as traditional brick-and-mortar businesses: they need to get compelling products and services in front of customers, and make buying simple, secure and pleasant. Discshop has first-hand experience of this. As demand for its online products (CDs, DVDs and computer games) grew, Discshop found that it needed a solution that would enable it to meet consumer demand, while maintaining a top-class website.
The Challenge
Discshop operates exclusively online, making it essential that the company�s website always remains online and provides customers with the best possible user experience. Managing web traffic is one way of meeting the challenge of a growing online market. This allows online retailers to prioritize web traffic for customers who are in the process of buying, or even to identify regular users and handle their demands first. Routing traffic away from busy or inactive servers means pages can load faster and payments are processed more quickly, ultimately creating a reliable and satisfying shopping experience.
Discshop needed to manage its growing web traffic, and wanted a software-based solution that was stable, fast and would allow it to reuse existing architecture without investing in new hardware. Discshop also required a solution that would allow it to load-balance connecting clients across several servers.
The company looked at a variety of possible vendors before selecting ZXTM (Zeus Extensible Traffic Manager). The first solution evaluated was simply a DNS roundrobin solution. It was discarded, as Discshop felt that it did not provide the session consistency and monitoring it needed. Other vendors� load-balancers were dismissed as too expensive. Finally, ZXTM was selected as the product that met all of Discshop�s requirements and provided excellent performance at a reasonable price.
The Solution
ZXTM is a programmable Application Traffic Manager, uniquely available as hardware, software or a virtual appliance. ZXTM has an easy to use graphical user interface (GUI) and provides smart monitoring of services and alerting.
�Even in the early stages of evalutating ZXTM, installation and configuration was made straightforward by its powerful GUI,� stated Peder Lanefelt, of Discshop. ZXTM was deployed on some of Discshop�s spare SUN Enterprise 420R hardware. This enabled the company to cut costs and become independent of proprietary hardware, as well as being more environmentally friendly. In addition, three new Dell (News - Alert) 2U rack servers were deployed as web-servers, to which ZXTM now routes connecting clients.
The Benefits
By deploying ZXTM on its server in Sweden, Discshop has been able to continue to offer fast, reliable and efficient web access, even in times of peak demand.
�ZXTM has proved to be an excellent choice for Discshop,� said Lanefelt. �It has allowed us to provide our customers with a higher level of service, ensuring faster page loading and smooth and secure transactions, which has led to very happy customers!
�ZXTM has run very smoothly since its deployment, which has resulted in enhanced performance of the company�s web servers,� continued Lanefelt. �We are particularly pleased that it was available as a software based solution, which has permitted us to update the machine it runs on, when required. �While our typical web traffic is 250 to 300 page requests per second, it can rise to as high as 800 page requests per second during peak times. The fact that ZXTM has never let us down is testament to what an ideal solution it is for online retailers.�
Discshop at a glance
Discshop was founded in1999 and the goal remains the same: to be the best retailer in Sweden, with a large selection, fast delivery, good service and an excellent online shop. With more than 12,000 films on DVD and 1,600 games available, Discshop has the largest selection of its kind in Sweden. Discshop sells more than 1 million DVD films and games per year and has an annual turnover of more than 150 million Swedish Kroner ($20 million US dollars)
Zeus at a glance
Zeus Technology (News - Alert) has a well-earned reputation for providing robust, secure and scalable traffic management solutions to organizations in a wide range of sectors including, media and content providers, telecoms and hosting providers, finance, education, government and online retailers. Using the experience gained from our relationships with organizations as diverse as Play.com, QuantumMail, NASA,
STA Travel and We Energies. Zeus is in a unique position to assist any business looking to enhance their mission-critical Internet service infrastructure.
For further information, please email: info@zeus.com or visit www.zeus.com to contact the Zeus office nearest to you.
Domain Name Server (DNS) | X | | DNS basic functions provide:
- A way to identify computers like phone numbers.
- Servers called Proxy Servers change web site URL-Uniform Resource Locator words and names such as www.techtionary.com...more |
Routing | X | | There are many often too many explanation of routing. Here�s one:
Hop-by-Hop Routing - IP Routing
- Distributes routing to routers
- Networks look/act like trees
- Data can traverse many routers ...more |
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