Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat » Simple SAN Archives – Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat http://blog.fosketts.net Understanding the accumulation of data Fri, 10 Feb 2012 17:40:43 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v= IBM Warms to the Compact Storage Market http://blog.fosketts.net/2007/08/28/ibm-warms-to-the-compact-storage-market/ http://blog.fosketts.net/2007/08/28/ibm-warms-to-the-compact-storage-market/#comments Tue, 28 Aug 2007 14:00:21 +0000 Stephen http://blog.fosketts.net/2007/08/28/ibm-warms-to-the-compact-storage-market/ With yesterday’s release of both an iSCSI version of it’s entry-level DS3300 and a complete, Microsoft Simple SAN-certified DS3400 solution, IBM is bringing the love to the … umm … well … compact (?) end of the storage market. See, we can’t call it “low-end” because these devices are decidedly not “low-end” in their functionality. And we can’t call it “entry-level” or “small business” because lots of established players buy this stuff. Modular and monolithic may describe some hardware, but it hardly differentiates the market. I refuse to start with tall like Starbucks (though you can get a super-tasty short cappuccino there!) So let’s just ape the car market and call it “compact”. There’s no shame in owning a compact car, especially with gas prices where they are, so why not get some compact storage to go with your green data center?

So what’s IBM doing this time? Well, they’ve taken LSI’s proven Engenio 1333 array technology (which they’ve used for a while) and turned on iSCSI functionality. IBM veers off course from the startups by not bundling snapshot and replication technology with their new array, however. This reduces the cost of entry but diminishes the impact of this new technology, since adding that software can easily double the price of this Ford Escort storage system.

IBM has also certified a complete Fibre Channel SAN solution with Microsoft, if you’re into that sort of thing. Their DS3400 can chat with an Emulex HBA and Brocade switch with quick setup and guaranteed compatability or your money back! (I made up that last part…) I’ve been pleased by Microsoft’s Simple SAN push in the past and think this is an excellent alternative to iSCSI for sites that aren’t ready to take the storage-over-Ethernet plunge yet.

Why care? Well, simply because this “compact” market is where the big action is in storage right now. Thanks to the VMware explosion, just about every smaller-than-10-TB shop is currently buying and deploying SANs right now, a fact that has warmed the hearts (and fed the sales people) at companies like EqualLogic, LeftHand, HP, Dell, and the rest for a year or so now. IBM was too early to market with an iSCSI array back in 2001, but has had nothing to sell since they axed the Adaptec-powered DS300/400 back in January. Welcome back!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2007. | IBM Warms to the Compact Storage Market
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]]> http://blog.fosketts.net/2007/08/28/ibm-warms-to-the-compact-storage-market/feed/ 0 Microsoft’s best-kept secret http://blog.fosketts.net/2007/06/20/microsofts-best-kept-secret/ http://blog.fosketts.net/2007/06/20/microsofts-best-kept-secret/#comments Wed, 20 Jun 2007 17:37:02 +0000 Stephen http://blog.fosketts.net/?p=4 I’ve said before that Microsoft’s work in the field of enterprise storage was truly remarkable. Every other operating system vendor, as well as the grubby hordes developing Linux and BSD, should be ashamed that the “evil empire” beat them to the punch with great storage ideas like VSS, VDS, and transportable backup integration. Well, it seems Microsoft is changing the SAN landscape in another way – the Simple SAN initiative.

Although most folks haven’t heard about it, Simple SAN is Redmond’s way to force vendors to improve interoperability and ease of installation for networked SAN storage, whether it is Fibre Channel or iSCSI.

How does this help us? Simply, Microsoft forced participating vendors to pair up qualified hardware and an integrated driver set with easy documentation, including a one-page poster for installation. Think TiVo easy.

And it works. I went up to EqualLogic on Monday and set up an iSCSI SAN myself. It was easy to get the thing started without cracking the books. Sadly, though, their poster ended right where I needed help – configuring Microsoft’s iSCSI initiator software, which proved to be a frustratingly multi-click, multi-tab, search-everywhere-and-click-advanced operation. Claude Lorenson promises to make it easier in the next rev… If I had cracked the books, I would have had all the answers, though.

All in all was so easy I got silly and started trying to do stupid stuff with it. Which I did! Since EqualLogic lets you write to snapshots, I made one and added it to a dynamic disk group of regular volumes. This is highly dumb, but it was fun to see it work. It was also fun to watch Victory by Design stream from one array while migrating the volume to another… But now I’m digressing!

Go see for yourself. Check out a Simple SAN product and be amazed what you can do. Despite some frustration, I bet any Windows admin could have a SAN up and running in under an hour. Which was the whole point…

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2007. | Microsoft’s best-kept secret
This post was categorized as Enterprise storage. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

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