Lots of my IT infrastructure management clients are talking about how the advent of Ethernet/IP and virtualization is changing the roles of storage, server, and network administrators. The evolution of the storage role in particular in enterprise IT organizations has been a topic of particular interest to me for a while: I definitely remember thinking about […]
Enterprise storage
Where Will Virtualization of Data Center Infrastructure Take Us?
Virtualization of IT systems decouples physical infrastructure from logical resources, hiding complexity and enabling new capabilities. However, not all potential benefits of virtualization have meaningful value outside IT circles: Too many of our discussions revolve around the very complexity that virtualization technology should be hiding! True business value is derived from transformed virtual resources in the next-generation data center, not the incremental capacity gains of virtual servers. But how will we get there, and what will this future look like?
Interop: Giving Back To Local Schools Through DonorsChoose.org
Although I am a big believer in personal face-to-face meetings, it often seems like a waste of energy to attend big tech conferences. I’m certainly making the rounds this year, having already made multiple trips to the West Coast and even the UK, and heading out again three times next month. That’s why I was pleased to see that one of the conferences I’m speaking at is trying to do some good for the local community: Interop will donate to math and science related projects in Las Vegas, and I encourage others to do the same.
Promise SANLink Thunderbolt Preview
Although the SANLink appears to be something of an oddball, it indicates the shape of things to come. Thunderbolt will transform the use cases for portable and all-in-one computers, likely spelling the end of the empty boxes for desktop use. In fact, I would not be at all surprised if Apple soon canceled the Mac Pro line entirely in favor of a beefed up Mac Mini and iMac stable. And the dozen or so MacBook Pro users wanting to connect to a Fibre Channel SAN will finally have the opportunity to do so sometime later this year.
Seagate Versus Western Digital: The Hard Disk Drive Battle Lines Are Drawn
Both Seagate and Western Digital have much to gain from these transactions. Western Digital becomes a full line giant of the industry, a credible competitor, and a successful supplier to OEMs. Seagate also retains its credibility in the market, but also gains access to Samsung, one of the strongest electronics companies in the world. Time will tell which of these companies got the better deal.
