Entries categorized under “InfiniBand”

As DCIG makes its final preparations for the release of its inaugural Purpose-Built Flash Memory Appliance Buyer's Guide, we have had a number of conversations internally about what the criteria for product inclusion and exclusion in this Buyer's Guide will be. As we do so, our conversation almost always turns to ways in which these purpose-built flash memory appliances will impact organizations and their decision making and buying habits. (read more)

Flash memory arrays almost always win the efficiency and performance battles when compared to hard disk drive storage arrays. It is for these reasons that comparisons between the two need to be redefined to reflect the distinctive features of each. Nimbus Data Systems Gemini breaks new ground with high availability, higher storage density, flash memory endurance and performance as well as new flexibility to configure storage networking ports. Combined these features illustrate how flash memory arrays should no longer be compared to hard disk drive storage arrays and instead be measured by a new set of standards. (read more)

In this final installment of our blog series on WhipTail Technologies, a Solid State Drive (SSD) array provider with some impressive features and capabilities, I am continuing my discussion with WhipTail Technologies Chief Technology Officer, James Candelaria. Last time, we looked at how WhipTail implements software RAID on its devices. Today, we will be discussing the different transport protocols supported by the WhipTail array and why the FCoE and iSCSI protocols trump Infiniband in today's SSD deployments. (read more)

However, during the many presentations that I attended and conversations that I had about this technology, SSD vendors revealed some key "gotchas" about SSDs. They also shared how SSDs stand to impact the hard disk drive (HDD) market as well as the market for memory as well. So here, in no particular order, are some of the new challenges and opportunities that SSDs create as well as what to watch out for. (read more)

A recurring theme in terms of what I hear from users is how VMware adds new complexities to their day-to-day management tasks. For instance, even before server virtualization came in vogue, companies were already complaining that their physical servers reproduced like rabbits. Server virtualization just makes server growth that much easier to occur since now companies don't even need to purchase a new physical machine anymore - it now is little more than a copy-and-paste like exercise to create a new virtual machine (VM) once server virtualization is in place. (read more)

As I write this blog entry, I am currently on a flight to New York City to attend the last day of the fall 2008 Storage Decisions conference. While I intend to post a blog entry about my experiences at SD this Friday, the flight is giving me some time to go back to last week and share some additional thoughts and insights I gained while attending the InfiniBand Trade Association (IBTA) Tech Forum in Las Vegas on Monday, Sept 15. While infiniband was obviously covered as part of this forum, it was done so in the larger context of what virtualizing the corporate infrastructure means and how that will contribute to how companies construct and manage their data centers in the future. (read more)

Day 2 at VMworld has come and gone and probably my biggest regret was that I had to miss this morning's keynote by VMware's new CEO, Paul Maritz. In reading through some other blogs this evening about the event and assuming Storagezilla called it right, it was a doozey essentially declaring open war on other operating systems. In any case, my day was focused on catching up with a number of vendors to get some of the latest behind the scenes scoop in the storage world. In fact, as one walks into the exhibitor hall in VMworld, it is hard not to mistake this conference for a storage conference. (read more)

It's day one at VMworld in Las Vegas and while the day for me began in Omaha NE at 4:30 am CST before landing in Las Vegas around 7:30 am PST, I did not join the throngs basking in the VMworld love fest. Instead I spent the day educating myself more about the topic of Infiniband by attending the InfiniBand Trade Association's (IBTA) annual tech forum that was held at Harrahs (Harrahs is adjacent to The Venetian where VMworld is being held). The reason that I elected to first attend the IBTA Tech Forum and not VMworld is simple. Everyone already knows that server virtualization is the BIG thing. What everyone doesn't know or understand is why Infiniband is making a case to become the next big thing in another form of virtualization: Virtualizating server I/O. (read more)

I believe a new way on thinking should be applied to the deployment on Infiniband technology in the storage landscape. Most of you probably think of Infiniband as predominately a backend transport for storage, and/or the interconnection mechanism for high compute clusters (HPC). Or, "Oh yeah, I heard something about that 5-6 years ago, isn't that only used in super-computing or giant research labs?" (read more)

I initially intended to share in this blog posting what I learned from my briefings on Day 3 of SNW. However I've had some more time to digest the news surrounding the FCoE announcements at SNW on Tuesday and the more I think about it, the more this whole FCoE strikes me as a huge setup that is being carefully orchestrated by the FC industry. Bottom line, Brocade, Emulex and Qlogic and, to a lesser extent, Cisco and Intel, used SNW as a platform to obviously promote FCoE but longer term to make sure enterprise data centers lock into FC for the next 10 years. (read more)

Xiotech made the first "earthshaking" announcements of the day at 7:00 am which mostly had those I spoke to shaking their heads trying to figure out what the announcement meant. The announcement centered on their new patented Intelligent Storage Element (ISE) technology that they acquired from Seagate last November that will, according to Xiotech, "virtually eliminate the need for service, scale from one terabyte to one petabyte and dramatically boost perfromance". (read more)

Last month I did some research and evaluation of Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE).  In my Part 1 of 3 I shared some elements that can encourage the use of FCoE in the data center.During my research I spent about... (read more)

When I received the assignment to review the FCoE specification and compare it to iFCP, FCIP and iSCSI (block protocols over data networks) I was thinking it might be boring, I was very wrong. After just a few short minutes with Claudio and Bill I knew I was talking to a pair of very intelligent and thoughtful business technologists. (read more)