It took longer than I expected for Nimble Storage to introduce an all-flash array, but their AF7000 looks to be a very credible offering. They’re targeting XtremIO and Pure with their marketing, but I expect HP, Dell, and especially NetApp to be cross-shopped more frequently. In that fight, I expect the Nimble AF7000 to be very attractive indeed!
3PAR
EMC XtremIO Upgrade is Non-Disruptive to Customers
EMC’s XtremIO is crapping on the badge; it’s an immature ball of destruction that shows how much architecture matters. Or so my favorite storage bloggers say. But customers and resellers seem to have a different take on the destructive XtremIO 3.0 update: They don’t care. Not at all.
Where Are They Now? A Tech Field Day Presenter Retrospective
After four years and 34 Tech Field Day events, many of our vendors have gone on to bigger and better things. After seeing today’s acquisition of Xsigo by Oracle, I decided to go back and look at how many of our companies have been acquired over the years.
HP’s Mighty Stumble
HP stumbled mightily in 2011, and it had nothing to do with product or people. Even sales remained strong, though the PC business is changing. HP’s mighty stumble was a crisis of confidence due to a chain of shenanigans at the very top. This culminated with the short reign of Léo Apotheker, leaving HP to reassure the market of its strategy.
VMware VAAI Storage Array Support in Plain English
The most exciting enhancements in VMware vSphere 4.1 is the addition of vStorage API for Array Integration (VAAI). This new API allows VMware ESX to offload storage processing functions to capable storage arrays, reducing the workload on the server hardware in introducing new and exciting possibilities for performance and efficiency. VAAI in ESX 4.1 includes three separate capabilities: block zeroing, full copy, and hardware assisted locking.