Dell
announced new Dell EqualLogic storage solutions and supporting software to help
customers address the data management needs of increasingly dynamic,
virtualized data centers.
The company
also released details of new integration across its storage portfolio with the
forthcoming VMware vSphere 5 virtualization and cloud infrastructure platform.
These
announcements represent another milestone in the continued evolution of Dell
Fluid Data solutions, designed to help customers more effectively manage
valuable business information in virtualized data centers.
“Organizations
of all sizes continue to place a priority on boosting IT asset efficiency while
improving IT responsiveness to business pressures. Ever greater exploitation of
virtualization is a key element in these efforts, and the deployment of
flexible and intelligent storage systems is frequently the key to successful
efforts,” said Richard Villars, vice president of storage and IT
Strategies at IDC.
Dell’s
continued investment in advanced yet cost effective storage solutions along
with a continued expansion of its enterprise service and solutions
organization, puts the company in a strong position to help IT organizations
get the most from their data centers.
In support of
customers’ growing storage demands, Dell introduced the EqualLogic PS6100 and
PS4100 family of virtualized, IP-based storage offerings.
Together with
new Dell EqualLogic firmware version 5.1, Dell offers customers its next generation of
EqualLogic storage solutions that seamlessly integrate into existing
environments without downtime or a major overhaul. This helps customers to
focus on managing their storage and not the manual process of upgrading
infrastructure.
Additionally,
customers can gain up to 60 percent performance improvement on typical
workloads with the EqualLogic PS Series compared to the previous generation
EqualLogic arrays.
EqualLogic
PS4100 Series, ideal for small-to-medium businesses or remote office locations
with growing storage needs. The SANs, supporting up to 36TB in a single array
and 72TB in a single group, can scale as storage demands increase by seamlessly
adding additional PS4100 or PS6100 arrays into an EqualLogic group.
EqualLogic
PS6100 Series designed to provide mid-sized customers with a scalable storage
environment, up to 72TB in a single array and 1.2PB in a single group, that can
easily accommodate both high-performance and high-capacity drive options.
The PS6100
family is ideal for customers looking for a storage solution to support the
storage demands of a highly virtualized data center environment where the
seamless movement and protection of virtual machines, applications and data is
crucial.
With the
newly redesigned, compact form factor, PS6100 customers can achieve the same
performance for their typical workload using half the number of arrays, and
receive 50 percent more expansion capacity when compared with the previous
generation EqualLogic arrays.
Dell also has
begun shipping the new EqualLogic FS7500, the company’s latest NAS solution
that works with EqualLogic PS Series arrays to deliver the only scale-out,
unified storage platform for mid-size deployments.
The FS7500
uses the Dell Scalable File System, which offers several advanced features
including cache monitoring, load balancing and multi-threading for fast I/O
processing.
Dell and
VMware have expanded their strategic partnership over the past decade,
collaborating on engineering integration and solutions development since server
virtualization first emerged.
As customers’
virtual environments have grown, Dell and VMware have worked together to
develop specifications for storage infrastructures, such as the VMware vSphere®
Storage APIs for Array Integration, and have delivered highly virtualized data
center and storage solutions to meet joint customer needs.
For example,
the latest EqualLogic firmware version 5.1 includes thin provisioning awareness
for VMware vSphere to help users save valuable recovery time and help mitigate
the risk of potential data loss. Dell is one of VMware’s largest global
resellers, helping enable the company to uniquely address customers’
virtualized storage needs.
In support of
the forthcoming VMware vSphere 5, Dell introduced a new set of VMware specific
enhancements for Dell EqualLogic, Dell Compellent and Dell PowerVault storage
customers. These will roll-out through Q3 and Q4 and include:
Dell
EqualLogic Host Integration Tools for VMware 3.1, provide customers with
enhanced storage visibility and datastore management as well as improved
performance and availability through tight integration with VMware vSphere 5,
VMware vSphere Storage APIs for Storage Awareness, VMware Storage Distributed
Resource Scheduler (SDRS), and VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager 5.
Dell
Compellent Storage Replication Adapter for VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager
5, supports automated failback from a disaster event and new workflows for
planned migrations and downtime. Dell also is updating its Compellent plug-in
support for VMware vSphere 5 to help customers more easily link their
Compellent storage environment with virtualized resources.
Dell
introduced additional capabilities to help customers gain insight into their
storage environment and also better integrate with Microsoft virtualization
offerings. Offering integrated, all-inclusive software, the EqualLogic platform
retains its ease of management as the system scales. New solutions that bring
enterprise-class functionality to smaller implementations include:
Dell
EqualLogic SAN Headquarters 2.2 software, includes new multi-site support so
customers can easily monitor the health and activity of their storage
environment across different geographies. The solution provides ongoing,
real-time diagnostic information to enable customers to optimize and tune their
system for performance and efficiency.
Dell
EqualLogic Host Integration Tools for Microsoft 4.0, re-designed to enhance the
usability experience with new features including centralized data protection
and more efficient management of multiple Microsoft hosts and virtual machines.
Enhanced Clustered Shared Volume (CSV) support has been designed to streamline
data protection for CSVs and improve capacity utilization.
The new
EqualLogic capabilities mark a significant next step in the evolution of the
Dell Fluid Data architecture and extend Dell’s leadership in virtualized
IP-based storage solutions that are easy to manage,” said Darren Thomas, vice
president and general manager, Dell Enterprise Storage.
By
Telecomlead.com Team
editor@telecomlead.com
