A micro data center (MDC) is a small-scale modular data center that includes all the compute, storage, networking, power, cooling, and other infrastructure required for a given workload.
In recent years, applications including IoT (Internet of Things), content delivery, and 5G have created a large demand for low-latency access to data processing and data storage. Traditional centralized data centers, such as those used by AWS (Amazon Web Services) and Microsoft Azure, weren’t designed with those use cases in mind. While these large-scale data centers create economies of scale and enable cloud computing, they cannot economically bring data processing close enough to end-users for these distributed workload use cases.
Ranging in size from a single 19-inch rack to a 40-foot shipping container, micro data centers are small enough to be deployed in locations where a traditional data center would be impractical. This allows organizations to solve the low-latency data processing and storage challenge in a cost-effective way.
An edge data center is a small data center that is located close to the edge of a network. It provides the same device found in traditional data centers but is contained in a smaller footprint, closer to end users and devices. Edge data centers can deliver cached content and cloud computing resources to these devices. The concept works off edge computing, which is a distributed IT architecture where client data is processed as close to the originating source as possible. Because the smaller data centers are positioned close to the end users, they are used to deliver fast services with minimal latency.
In an edge computing architecture, time-sensitive data may be processed at the point of origin by an intermediary server that is located in close geographical proximity to the client. The point is to provide the quickest content delivery to an end device that may need it, with as little latency as possible. Data that is less time-sensitive can be sent to a larger data center for historical analysis, big data analytics and long-term storage. Edge data centers work off of the same concept, except instead of just having one intermediary server in close geographical proximity to the client, it's a small data center -- that can be as small as a box. Even though it is not a new concept, edge data center is still a relatively new term.
The major benefit of an edge data center is the quick delivery of services with minimal latency, thanks to the use of edge caching. Latency may be a big issue for organizations that have to work with the internet of things (IoT), big data, cloud and streaming services. Edge data centers can be used to provide high performance with low levels of latency to end users, making for a better user experience.
