Most IT managers suspect that they may not be putting enough of their systems resources to use to justify the cost of building out data centers. But for many, it's difficult to prove and find which servers are underutilized and by how much -- and then reconfigure the data center for optimized use and performance.

While I typically focus on network gear such as routers, switches and acceleration devices, this week a product upgrade from an upstart made me ponder the importance of systems optimization in data centers. The start-up out of Canada, CiRBA, proposes to help enterprise IT managers survey their existing resources and evaluate how they could be consolidated, stacked and better put to use for optimum resource consumption.

The company, which I included in my 10 management companies to watch round up, doesn't exactly fit the bill as a traditional network or systems management vendor. CiRBA focuses its analysis software on helping customers better manage existing IT resources by uncovering underutilized servers and determining how to best consolidate or stack resources for maximum results.

This week CiRBA announced Version 4.0 of its flagship Data Center Intelligence (DCI) product that now includes more interactive features, which tap the company's data collection and correlation technology to provide end users with a real-time analysis Web portal. IT managers use the Web portal to pose "what, if" scenarios regarding their existing infrastructure, business priorities and application workloads, and the software delivers various scorecards and reports as to how well each scenario plays out. The compatibility reports let IT managers know which applications should reside on servers performing certain workloads or if they should be kept separate based on business rules (new in Version 4.0), such as if an organization requires its financial applications reside on secure servers with restricted access.

The software installs on a server or group of servers and collects configuration and other data from any IP addressable endpoints using distributed software agents. The software also includes pre-built rules about various applications, systems and other elements to help customer avoid some common "gotchas" when working to consolidate resources. The software can now instantly through the interactive user interface churn the data collected so IT managers get a very up-to-date and accurate depiction of their IT resources, company representatives say.

Ann Bednarz is associate news editor at Network World.