Tungsten Clustering vs. DIY Solution

Learn why Tungsten Clustering is a better (complete, proven) and more cost-effective (software, 24/7 support and consulting all included) MySQL High Availability (HA), Disaster Recovery (DR) and Geographically-Distributed (Geo-Scale) solution compared to DIY Solution.

For any MySQL clustering to be a complete high-availability and disaster recovery solution, it requires three core components working in sync: connectivity (proxy), management (orchestration) and replication (local/global).

Tungsten Clustering

Tungsten Clustering includes three highly integrated and fully tested components Tungsten Proxy, Tungsten Manager and Tungsten Replicator working together to provide both local (individual clusters) and global (multiple clusters working together) data service for continuous 24/7 MySQL operations.

Connectivity

Complete and Integrated
(Tungsten Proxy)

Orchestration

Integrated Business Rules
(Tungsten Manager)

Replication

Advanced Local and Global
(Tungsten Replicator)

DIY Solution

“Do It Yourself” may seem attractive to be able to pick and choose technologies, but the level of effort is quite high when considering the high level of orchestration required to maintain a highly available cluster. The effort grows exponentially when adding additional sites or creating a geo-deployment. In a critical system, failure scenarios must be fully enumerated and tested to ensure continuous operations. When questions arise or incidents occur, support is generally not available for a DIY system.

Connectivity

Direct or 3rd party solution

Orchestration

Depends on level of effort and time

Replication

Pick replication choice for local clusters, use asynchronous for global replication

	Tungsten Cluster	DIY Solution
Connectivity	Complete and Integrated (Tungsten Proxy)	Direct or 3rd party solution
Orchestration	Integrated Business Rules (Tungsten Manager)	Depends on level of effort and time
Replication	Advanced Local and Global (Tungsten Replicator)	Pick replication choice for local clusters, use asynchronous for global replication

Do-It-Yourself (DIY) MySQL Clustering Solution Comparison

Use Cases Supported

MySQL HA

Supported

MySQL DR

Supported

MySQL Zero Downtime Maintenance

Supported

MySQL Continous Operations

Supported

MySQL Multi-Primary

Supported

MySQL Active/Passive Clusters

Supported

MySQL Active/Active Clusters

Supported

MySQL Geo-Scale Clusters

Supported

Features & Benefits

Continuous Operations

4.67

3.00

Zero Downtime Maintenance

Both database, operating system and hardware changes & upgrades

Needs manual reconfiguration

High Availability

Automatic failover of primary

Needs to be developed

DR with Active/Passive Cluster

Automated site level switch with one failover command

Needs to be developed

DR with Active/Active Cluster

Only requires repointing the apps

Needs to be developed

DR Failback

Single command, fast

Needs to be developed

Backup & Data Recovery

Flexible backups using existing external tools

Using existing tools

Scalability/Read replicas

4.40

3.40

Scalability/Read replicas

Supported

Needs to be developed

Scalability/Physical location

Deploy anywhere, on-prem and in the cloud (also hybrid- and multi-cloud)

Choice of where to deploy

Scalability/Instance size

Choose the instance size, minimal requirements

Needs to be developed

DB Node Auto-Scale

No auto-scale. Requires manual steps

Needs to be developed

DB Cluster Scaling

Ideal for the SaaS apps (Pod Architecture)

Needs to be developed

Geographic Scaling

5.00

2.00

Scalability/Read replicas

Across regions, availability zones, and clouds

Needs to be developed, but also requires considerable testing

Active/Active Geo-Clusters

Multi-site active/active supported and widely deployed

Needs to be developed, but also requires considerable testing

Active/Passive Geo-Clusters

Supported and widely deployed in cross-regions and cross-clouds, also on-premises

Needs to be developed, but also requires considerable testing

Performance

4.75

2.75

Smart-Scale

Tungsten Proxy with automatic read/write split, no application changes

Very difficult, few tools available

Load Balancing

Highly configurable with automatic read/write splitting

Needs to be developed

Up to Date Read Replicas

Using asynchronous replication

Needs to be developed, requires specific tools

Robust Database Performance

Tune your favorite database, asynchronous replication adds almost no performance penalty

Depends on implementation and development

Transparency

5.00

3.67

No Application Changes

Works out of box without app changes

Depends on implementation and development

All MySQL Versions

Native MySQL: Community, MySQL Enterprise, MariaDB, Percona Server, all versions

Chose MySQL version, though it may not be possible to mix versions

Compatibility With All Database Engines

All MySQL engines

Depending on implementation

Security

4.33

2.67

Security/Encryption at rest

Can leverage existing cloud or filesystem encryption technologies

Can leverage existing cloud of filesystem encryption technologies

Security/Encryption in flight

Supported for all traffic

Needs to be developed

Compliance (PCI, HIPAA)

Can be used in security/privacy standards

Much more effort required to pass and show continuing compliance

Management and Monitoring

4.80

2.00

Deployment

Easy to deploy

Difficult, must be developed, orchestrated, tested

Cluster Management

Easy management via web-based GUI

Much more effort to develop tools, or combine existing tools

Monitoring - GUI

Much more effort to develop tools, or combine existing tools

Full monitoring, though enhanced monitoring is charged extra

Alerts / Notifications

Integration with notifications systems

Much more effort to develop tools, or combine existing tools

OS/DB Patching

Assistance with scripts, no downtime

Needs to be developed

Real-time Data (Analytics, Data Lake, Reporting)

5.00

2.00

Replication Into Analytics

Needs to be developed but few tools available for real-time replication

Filtering

Complex filtering at schema and data level

Needs to be developed, but few tools handle complex filtering

Cluster Aware

Replication stream not interupted by loss of a single cluster node

Needs to be developed but few tools available for real-time replication

Support Services

24/7 Support

5.00

0.67

24/7 Support

24/7 support with high, near 100% customer satisfaction

Each tool in use is individually supported, some only by forums

Fast Support Reponse Time

The fastest in the industry, averaging less than 3 minutes for Urgent support request.

Depends on tool

Support Team Experience

Each member has 20+ years experience on DBA and Site Reliability

Depends on tool

Intangibles

MySQL Version Support

5.00

MySQL Community

Fully supported, all versions up to 8.0

Chose MySQL version, though it may not be possible to mix versions

MySQL Enterprise

Fully supported, all versions up to 8.0

Chose MySQL version, though it may not be possible to mix versions

MariaDB

Fully supported, all versions up to 10.5

Chose MySQL version, though it may not be possible to mix versions

Percona Server

Fully supported

Chose MySQL version, though it may not be possible to mix versions

Infrastructure and Platform

5.00

4.50

On-premises Deployment

Fully supported

Can be fully supported

Cloud Deployment

All cloud environments (AWS, Google Cloud, MS Azure) are supported

Can be fully supported

Multi-Cloud

Fully supported

Can be supported with substantial effort

Hybrid-Cloud

Fully supported

Can be supported with substantial effort

Product Maturity

5.00

0.33

Complete

One solution for HA, DR & Geo-Scale

Entire system needs to be developed using various components

Integrated

Comes with Manager, Proxy & Replicator

Have to pick and choose each components, verify compatability

Fully Tested

Proven in business-critical customer environments

You have to test each scenario, retest when updating components

Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)

4.33

1.00

Low Subscription Cost, High Value

Instance size does not matter, non-linear pricing (additional clusters are at increasingly lower cost), no cost TrueUps

Initial cost may be low but requires time and dedication from staff

24/7 Support

Included

Each componment may be supported but not as a system

Few DBA Resource Needed

Large number of clusters can be managed with small number of DBAs

Requires knowledgable team and and time to design, implement, and test

Tungsten Clustering

Tungsten Clustering comes at an equal or often lower total cost of ownership (TCO) versus alternative solutions and provides access to the best MySQL database engineers at a moments notice via 24/7 human-only enterprise support.

The Tungsten Clustering family of products is the only complete, fully-integrated, fully-tested MySQL HA, DR and geo-clustering solution running on-premises and in the cloud combined with industry-best and fastest, 24/7 support for business-critical MySQL, MariaDB, & Percona Server applications.

Continuous Operations

High Availability

Disaster Recovery

Global Scaling

Upgrade From the Following Solutions

Amazon Aurora

Galera Cluster
(aka XtraDB Cluster and MariaDB Cluster)

MySQL InnoDB Cluster

Google CloudSQL

Microsoft Azure Database for MySQL

ClusterControl

Do It Yourself Solution
(such as with ProxySQL and Orchestrator)

Experience Our Industry-Best Continuent MySQL Support

Highly qualified 24/7 MySQL support

Our support engineers have 15 or more years of MySQL DBA and Site Reliability experience

24/7 support comes with 1-hour SLA, with response times for urgent requests averaging less than 3 minutes

MySQL uptime measured in months or years

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