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| by Scott Cooper |
Users extol iSCSI benefits, part 2
INFOSTOR MAGAZINE, FEBRUARY 2008.
Users extol iSCSI benefits, part 2
By Dave Simpson and Kevin Komiega
The first article in our series of case studies on why
users are embracing iSCSI-based IP SANs
concentrated primarily on the benefits of iSCSI in
virtual server environments (see January 2008, p. 1).
In the second part of our series, we focus on
organizations that went with iSCSI for reasons such
as performance, consolidation and, of course, low
cost.
1. MisterArt.com: High performance
The company's existing storage infrastructure
consisted primarily of a Dell/EMC CX300-based Fibre
Channel SAN. However, for its storage expansion,
MisterArt.com wanted to save money while meeting all
of its performance requirements which, after testing
several iSCSI arrays, led to deployment of an iSCSI-
based Dell PowerVault MD3000i disk array coupled to
a 15-drive MD1000 expansion enclosure for a total
capacity of 9TB in a 30-drive configuration.
2. Consumer Contact: Performance counts
Before deploying an iSCSI SAN, Consumer Contact
had relied on direct- attached storage (DAS) arrays
from vendors such as EMC and IBM-most recently, an
IBM EXP400 chassis with a ServerRAID controller card
configured with 14 Ultra320 SCSI drives. But the
company was experiencing performance bottlenecks,
mostly in the area of disk access times for its
employees and interviewers. Typically, anywhere from
200 to 300 users are banging on Consumer Contact's
storage system simultaneously.
Consumer Contact had tried NAS previously, but that
approach didn't come close to solving the company's
performance problems. The company also evaluated
a Fibre Channel SAN (based on a Clariion disk array),
but that approach proved cost-prohibitive, according to
Liam Cunningham, systems manager at Consumer
Contact. The solution turned out to be a 16-drive
PS3600 iSCSI array from EqualLogic (which is being
acquired by Dell).
The PS3600 is attached to a single Linux server. For
performance, Consumer Contact added two iSCSI
HBA accelerator cards from QLogic. The iSCSI-based
IP SAN is isolated from the company's primary LAN
and includes a dedicated Ethernet switch from Cisco.
The primary application in the iSCSI environment is
the Data And Software Handling (DASH) application.
According to Cunningham, the EqualLogic-based IP
SAN eliminated the company's performance
problems, which in turn led to a 15% increase in
employee productivity versus the previous DAS-based
configuration.
3. Law firm: Software included "We couldn't justify the complexity or cost of Fibre Channel," says Siansky. "Fibre Channel has reliability and speed benefits, but there just wasn't enough of an ROI for us." "Compatibility with VMware was critical, and we wanted a system with bundled software, replication tools, and no additional license fees," Siansky explains. iSCSI products from Xiotech, Network Appliance, and LeftHand Networks made the law firm's short list. All three, according to Siansky, had feature sets and configurations that met his needs and all were competitively priced, but the all- inclusive nature of LeftHand's SAN/iQ software sealed the deal. 4. HMC: iSCSI + NAS gateway "Everything favors iSCSI in the long run, and with the emergence of 10Gbps Ethernet we have enough headroom to scale," says Andy Davenport, systems and networks group leader at HMC. The college installed a model 9240 Unified Storage Gateway from Reldata, which supports iSCSI SANs, NAS (CIFS and NFS), and WAN replication. At HMC, the 9240 gateway is configured with dual active-active controllers in a fail-over setup. The system also includes four Gigabit Ethernet ports (the 9240 can also be configured with a 10Gbps Ethernet port), the RELvos 2.1 operating system, 10Gbps Ethernet connectivity, SAS disk drives, and backup and replication software. Reldata's systems allow users to connect third-party disk subsystems. HMC, for example, added disks and a JBOD array it already had to boost capacity. In a Reldata SAN, all of the storage appears as a single, virtualized storage pool. -DS |
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| by Scott Cooper |
NearPoint Content Monitoring
This week at Legal Tech, Mimosa Systems will be
unveiling the newest product in its line-up of leading
email and live content archiving solutions - Mimosa
Systems NearPoint Content Monitoring Option.
With a marked rise in litigation and e-discovery
requests, the market is in need for solid content
monitoring solutions and NearPoint is the ideal
system to deliver to your customers. Here's why:
- Custodian's mailboxes are monitored for specific
content in real time.
- Highly granular monitoring policies can be created
with an easy-to-use policy creation wizard.
- Simple, common-sense reviewer's interface enables
quick review.
- Customizable keyword lists allow for the creation of
lexicons.
- Comprehensive reporting and logging for audit
purposes.
- Scalability to thousands of reviewers and millions of
messages daily.
- Immediate email alerts prompt the auditor or
manager to review questionable content, so alerts do
not need to be manually checked every day.
These benefits are in addition to the NearPoint benefits we are already promoting to your customers: - All emails and attachments are archived to a separate, secure archive server. - Emails can be fully indexed in both the email message and all attachments - "Live archiving" ensures all messages, calendar entries, contacts, task lists and notes are captured and protected. - Litigation holds are immediate and managed. |
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| by Scott Cooper |
VMWARE & Lefthand VSA SAN Starter Kit Combined
LeftHand Networks and VMware Announce
Virtualization Solution Kits.
LeftHand has been delivering easy-to-grow, easy-to-
manage physical iSCSI SANs since 2001. In October
2007, LeftHand introduced the Virtual SAN Appliance
(VSA) software giving your customers equipped with
VMware ESX servers a full featured and affordable
virtual SAN appliance. In early February, VMware and
LeftHand announced that they have teamed together
to create new Virtualization Solution Kit bundles.
These Virtualization Solutions Kits extend the value of
the existing VMware Infrastructure Acceleration Kits by
adding shared storage or a virtual SAN via LeftHand
Networks Virtual SAN Appliance (VSA) for VMware
ESX.
The LeftHand VSA addresses the cost, complexity and
high availability concerns of customers implementing
VMware advanced features such as HA, VMotion, and
DRS. The VMware VI Accelerations Kits make it easier
for customers to take advantage of enterprise-class
virtualization.
The unique value proposition of the Virtualization
Solution Kits centers on delivering a highly available
virtual infrastructure (storage and/or application) at a
more affordable price point than previously available.
In this case, affordable does not mean sacrificing
capabilities either since both VMware Infrastructure
and LeftHand Networks VSA is scalable and
extensible.
There are four Virtualization Solution Kit options.
These kits can help customers save money over
purchasing the software components separately. The
kits help your SMB customers or customers with
remote offices eliminate the need for an external SAN,
saving them cost, space, power, cooling and ongoing
maintenance. The first two kits provide highly available
applications AND storage. The second 2 kits provide
highly available applications.
Standard HA Acceleration Kit with Virtual
SAN (2 LeftHand Virtual SAN Appliances)
Midsize Acceleration Kit with Virtual SAN (3 LeftHand
Virtual SAN Appliances)
Standard HA Acceleration Kit with Shared Storage
(VSA iSCSI Target Version)*
Midsize Acceleration Kit with Shared Storage (VSA
iSCSI Target Version)*
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| by Scott Cooper |
Disk-Based Backup Systems with Data Deduplication
Eliminate the challenges of tape backup
without changing your backup budget with Disk-
based Backup with Data De-duplication.
ExaGrid offers a highly scalable disk-based backup
system that works with your existing backup
application and combines high quality SATA storage,
compression and byte-level data de-duplication with a
virtualized GRID architecture. This unique approach
reduces the disk space required for backup by a range
of 10 to 50:1, delivering unparalleled cost savings and
performance at a fraction of the price of standard SATA
disk storage.
There are five core ExaGrid disk-based backup
servers. These servers include GRID computing
software. When plugged into a switch they virtualize
into one another. As a result, any of the five
configurations can be mixed and matched into a
single GRID system, with capacities up to 60TB, in
1TB increments. Once virtualized, they appear as a
single system to the backup server. Load balancing of
all data across servers is automatic and multiple
GRID systems can be combined for additional
capacity.
- 1TB EX1000
- 2TB EX2000
- 3TB EX3000
- 4TB EX4000
- 5TB EX5000
For example, a 5TB ExaGrid server can store a 5TB full
backup (5TB of primary data) plus up to 16 weeks of
retention/history, while a 2TB server can take in a 2TB
full backup (2TB of primary data) plus up to 16 weeks
of retention. If a 20TB system is required, then four
EX5000s are plugged into the switch and virtualize into
a single system.
Eliminates failed backups and restores Greatly reduces your backup window Works with your existing backup application Perfect for environments with backups of 1TB to 60TB Disk-based backup with compression/data de- duplication at the cost of tape Optional WAN-efficient offsite system for tape replacement/disaster recovery ExaGrid's byte-level data de-duplication technology stores changes from backup to backup instead of storing full file copies. This unique approach reduces the disk space required by 10 to 50:1, or more, delivering unparalleled cost savings and performance |
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| by Scott Cooper |
Wins Storage Magazine "Product of the Year".
Selected from a record number of nominations and a
list of ten finalists in the backup and disaster recovery
software category, CommVault announced that the
CommVault Simpana Software Suite has received the
gold award in the 2007 Storage magazine and
SearchStorage.com Product of the Year awards.
Adding to CommVault's growing list of product
accolades, this honor further reinforces the technical
superiority and market leadership of the CommVault
Simpana 7.0 Software Suite with its uniquely singular
approach to data and information management. The
Simpana Software suite has been designed from the
ground up to integrate seamlessly and deliver a
common platform for backup, recovery, replication and
archive operations, and this latest award builds on
CommVault's industry momentum and the traction
Simpana software has seen since its July 2007
launch.
CommVault Simpana software folds backup, archive, replication (including CDP), search and reporting into a single data management software application. CommVault Simpana 7.0 software also includes a new search capability that offers full content indexing for hundreds of content types, and search across online, backup and archive storage tiers. With its Web- based interface, the search facility is straightforward enough that business, legal or compliance staff members can use it. CommVault Simpana 7.0 also includes Single Instance Store (SIS) for de-duplicating backup and archive data, as well as enhanced encryption and security with improved integration with Active Directory and LDAP. |
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| by Scott Cooper |
Tiered Data Protection Webcasts March 12-27th, 2008
Overland Storage is offering free educational
Webcasts on the subject of Tiered Data Protection.
You are invited to attend as they teach the best
practices in disaster recovery planning, maximizing
tiers of storage for data protection, improving the
speed of data backups and recovery, and how to do all
of this within a reasonable budget. Overland presents
these Webcasts as part of our new Tiered Data
Protection mirco-site at Overland University!
Overland "professors" are storage experts and will be
available for questions and interaction during these
hour long sessions. Consider this program as
free "consulting" on four key areas of study:
Reduce Backup Windows
Improve Recovery Speed
Simplify Data Retention
Enable Affordable Disaster Recovery
We will be presenting webcasts in each of the four
areas of study throughout February and March.
Reserve your space today, because space is limited!
ACT NOW - Register For One or More Webcasts Today! Each entry will count toward a drawing of a free Garmin NUVI 660 Portable GPS System. |
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