New
network attached storage systems, advanced file virtualization
and data classification offerings, and expanded partnerships
highlight the product rollouts at the Storage Decisions conference
in New York.
Here's a guide to who's announcing what:
OnStor beefs up Pantera clusters
OnStor launched the Pantera 5000 NAS system, which will support
more than twice as many drives as its predecessor, the Pantera
2000. With 750 GB drives (also newly supported in the Pantera
5000), Pantera now scales up to 672 TB across 8 nodes with 112
drives per node. The Pantera 2000 supports a maximum of 48 drives
per node and scales to 250 TB in an 8-node cluster. OnStor plans to
support 1 TB drives by the end of the year, making it possible for
the 5000 to scale to a petabyte.
SGI announces new NAS line
SGI is combining its XFS high-performance computing (HPC) file
system with server hardware to create a new line of pre-packaged
NAS devices. The new devices, called the Nexis series, can serve as
standalone systems or run in clustered pairs. Configurations
include a Nexis 1000 gateway, a Nexis 5000 with SATA disk for
nearline and archival storage, and the Nexis 7000 HA for primary
storage.
Attune debuts heterogeneous snapshot feature
Attune Systems, the last independent file virtualization vendor
after F5's $210 million acquisition of Acopia, is making
heterogeneous snapshots generally available in its new FM-6100
appliance.
Attune's heterogeneous snapshot works by stitching together
snapshots from separate Windows file servers or NetApp NAS heads
into a single logical view. The snapshots can also be mounted to
any device, regardless of which devices the data originated from.
Attune also offers replication of snapshots between heterogeneous
devices with this release.
The FM-6100 costs $29,995 for a standalone configuration in a 5u
form and $84,995 in an HA version with a separate disk array for
holding metadata.
Abrevity overhauls data classification engine
Data classification startup Abrevity is trying to avoid the fate of
recently-defunct competitor Scentric by making its FileData
Classifier and FileData Manager more scalable. Abrevity has added a
distributed database engine to the products so servers in different
sites can correlate data-classification indices. Previously, the
FileData products were confined to one server that could not scale
above 20 TB, according to Abrevity's vice president of product
strategy Eric Madison. Abrevity also added a new Google-like
discovery search, policy-based data management and migration tools
and a new reporting engine embedded from partner, SoftwareFX.
Emulex demonstrates HBA-based authentication
Emulex announced that its LightPulse 4 Gbps FC HBAs can perform
fabric-based security authentication using the Fibre Channel
Security Protocol (FC-SP), newly ratified by the T11 standards
committee a year ago. FC-SP uses the Diffie Hellman - Challenge
Handshake Authentication Protocol (DH-CHAP) to "handshake" between
FC switches and HBAs. It's meant to prevent world wide name (WWN)
spoofing and keep rogue servers from being attached to the SAN.
Emulex will demonstrate the new feature with Cisco on the Storage
Decisions show floor.
Pillar adds FalconStor dedupe
Pillar Data Systems becomes the first storage vendor to add
FalconStor's single instance repository (SIR) data deduplication
feature. Pillar will offer SIR as part of an expanded reseller
agreement combining its Axiom array with FalconStor's virtual tape
library (VTL).
Two other FalconStor VTL partners, IBM and Sun, are testing the
SIR feature. EMC, another FalconStor OEM partner, has its own
deduplication from its Avamar acquisition a year ago.
Pillar has certified the Axiom as interoperable with three other
data deduplication partners: Data Domain Inc., Diligent
Technologies Corp. and Symantec Corp.'s NetBackup PureDisk.
Monosphere supports HDS storage
Monosphere continued incremental updates to its Storage Horizon SRM
software, adding support for Hitachi Data Systems' Lightning 9900 V
series, Thunder 9500 V Series, and TagmaStore Universal Storage
Platform (USP) arrays in version 3.5.
Also, be sure to keep an eye on our
Storage Soup blog for rumors and chatter from
the show, and if you're at the event, feel free to post your
comments on anything interesting you learn.