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Data Infrastructure IT Industry Related Resource Links A to E

Data Infrastructure IT Industry Related Resource Links A to E

IT Data Center and Data Infrastructure Industry Resources

Updated 2/20/2018

Following are some useful Data Infrastructure IT Industry Resource Links A to E to cloud, virtual and traditional IT data infrastructure related web sites. The data infrastructure environment (servers, storage, IO and networking, hardware, software, services, virtual, container and cloud) is rapidly changing. You may encounter a missing URL, or a URL that has changed. This list is updated on a regular basis to reflect changes (additions, changes, and retirement).

Disclaimer and note: URL’s submitted for inclusion on this site will be reviewed for consideration and to be in generally accepted good taste in regards to the theme of this site.

Best effort has been made to validate and verify the data infrastructure URLs that appear on this page and web site however they are subject to change. The author and/or maintainer(s) of this page and web site make no endorsement to and assume no responsibility for the URLs and their content that are listed on this page.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

Send an email note to info at storageio dot com that includes company name, URL, contact name, title and phone number along with a brief 40 character description to be considered for addition to the above data infrastructure list, or, to be removed. Note that Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC (e.g. StorageIO) does not sell, trade, barter, borrow or share your contact information per our Privacy and Disclosure policy. View related data infrastructure Server StorageIO content here, and signup for our free newsletter here.

Links A-E
Links F-J
Links K-O
Links P-T
Links U-Z
Other Links

  • A3Cube    Computer I/O solution startup
  • AAPT   AAPT    AWS connect partner, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • abiquo.com    Cloud development and management tools
  • Above.net/Zayo Group    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • abrevity.com    eDiscovery, search, indexing, classification
  • accellion.com    File transfer tools
  • accessopt.com    Holographic storage
  • acinion.com    Video solutions
  • acopia.com    NAS aggregation and global name space (bought by F5)
  • acronis.com    Backup and data protection tools
  • acsacs.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • acs-inc.com    Hosting, outsourcing and managed services (Bought by Xerox)
  • actifio.com    Data protection solutions
  • active-circle.com    Data archiving and storage solutions
  • activestate.com    Stackato PaaS for cloud tools
  • adaptec.com    Adapters, iSCSI storage, data backup solutions (See PMC)
  • adesto.com    CBRAM startup
  • addonics.com    SSD storage solutions
  • adic.com    Backup, Dedupe and data protection solutions (Bought by Quantum)
  • adinfa.com        Energy and resource management tools
  • AdRem Netcrunch        Monitoring of Networks, Systems and Applications, DCIM
  • Adtran    Datacom and networking solutions
  • advancedvault.com    Business continuity solutions
  • advaoptical.com    Optical networking
  • afcom.com    Data center industry user group
  • aforesolutions.com    Cloud storage and infrasture management tools
  • agami.com    High performance NAS storage (Shutdown)
  • agilent.com    Host adapters and test equipment
  • agility.com    Optical solutions and components
  • agilysys.com    VAR
  • aiim.com    Archiving and records management trade group
  • ait.com    Cloud and web hosting
  • Ajubeo    Cloud and management solutions
  • akamai.com    Content distribution network (CDN)
  • akitio.com    Storage systems
  • akorri.com    Storage resource and capacity management
  • alacritech.com    Storage networking adapters for iSCSI
  • alacritus.com    Data Protection Software
  • alcatel.com    Networking and storage networking equipment
  • alliance-it.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • allstorage.nl    Storage services solution provider
  • amazon.com    Cloud compute and storage services
  • AmberPoint.com    SOA management tools
  • amcc.com    Storage networking components (aka JNI & 3ware Bought by LSI)
  • amd.com    Server and processor chips
  • americanfibersystems.com    Metropolitan storage networks and fiber bandwidth
  • amphenol.com    Storage Networking connectors and cables
  • Amplidata.com    Object and wide area based storage
  • ancot.com    Storage networking testing equipment
  • anixter.com    Networking components
  • Anobit.com    Memory components
  • ansi.org    American National Standards Institute
  • Anstor64.com    iSCSI storage software
  • anuesystems.com    SONET’/SDH and network test equipment
  • apc.com    Environmental and power systems and DCIM solutoins
  • apcon.com    Physical cabling and management
  • aperture.com    Data center tools including CMDB (Bought by Emerson)
  • appassue.com    SQL server and data protection tools (Bought by Dell)
  • Appcore    Cloud management tools
  • Appfirst    IT Ops, Development and DCIM monitoring and PKI metrics
  • appiq.com    Storage Management Software (Bought by HP)
  • appirio.com    Cloud and content tools and services
  • apple.com    Server and storage
  • apprenda.com    Grid and data management tools
  • Apprenda   Platform as a service tools
  • aprius.com    PCIe Server I/O virtualization (IOV) technology
  • aptare.com    Data protection management and backup reporting
  • arasan.com    IP Networking components
  • Archivas.com    Archiving and data management software (Bought by HDS)
  • arcmail.com    Email archiving
  • Arcplace    Data management archiving
  • arcsight.com    Compliance solutions
  • argent.com    Data center management and CMDB tools
  • ariodata.com    Scalable data storage and blade storage systems
  • aristanetworks.com    Networking technologies
  • aristoslogic.com    Storage controller technology (Bought by Adaptec)
  • Arkeia.com    Backup and data protection software (Bought by WD)
  • arkivio.com    Storage management and ILM software
  • arm.com    Microprocessor producer
  • armor247.com    SMB focused data protection solutions
  • arrow.com    Distributor
  • arsenaldigital.com    Managed backup service (Bought by IBM)
  • arxscan.com    SRM and file reporting software
  • asankya.com    Application delivery and cloud access
  • asciitable.com    Site containing the ASCII character set table
  • ashare.org    HVAC Engineers Association
  • asigra.com    Backup and data protection solutions
  • asnp.org    Association Storage Networking Professionals
  • asperasoft.com    High speed file and data transfer tools
  • astaro.com    Security tools
  • astutenetworks.com    iSCSI storage optimized for VMware
  • atempo.com    Backup Software
  • Atlantic Metro Communications    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • Atlantiscomputing    ILIO VDI and I/O optimization, cache tools
  • atmforum.com    ATM trade association
  • atrato.com    Storage systems
  • attachmate.com    IT management tools (bought Novell)
  • attotech.com    Storage networking adapters and gateways
  • Attunesystems.com    NAS and file virtualization (Assets bought by F5)
  • attunity.com    File and data movement tools
  • autonomy.com    Data management and cloud services (Bought by HP) –
  • autovirt.com    Storage automation tiering tools
  • avagotech.com    Semiconductor technologies
  • availl.com    Data movement and replication solutions
  • avamar.com    Dedupe, Backup and Restoration Solutions (Bought by EMC)
  • avanade.com    Var
  • avaya.com    Networking and communications
  • averesystems.com    NAS caching and automated tiering
  • avg.com    Security and anti-virus software
  • avnet.com    Distributor
  • www.avocent.com    Infrastructure resource management tools
  • axcient.com    Cloud data protection solutions
  • axiossystems.com    IRM and service management tools
  • axsone.com    Records and document management
  • axxana.com    Data protection and replication tools
  • Backblaze    Online and cloud backup storage
  • BackupAssist    Backup and Recovery software
  • backupify.com    Backup for google apps
  • BUMI    Backup and data protection tools
  • backupright.com    Online and cloud backup
  • Backula    Opensource Backup and data protection
  • bakbone.com    Backup Software (Bought by Quest bought by Dell)
  • balesio.com    File compression solutions
  • barracudanetworks.com    Networking devices, backup software
  • basho.com    NOSQL Database and object storage technology –
  • batblue.com    Cloud, application delivery networking services
  • Bestel   Bestel    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • Beyondtust    Vulnerability assessment and detection
  • bigswitch.com    Openflow based network switches
  • BitArmor.com    Data security software
  • bitcasa.com    Cloud storage and backup
  • Bitcentral    Video management solutions
  • Bitmicro    Solid state devices and other solutions
  • Blackbox    Data center infrastructure, DCIM, KVM and other solutions
  • BlackMESH    FedRAMP and DevOPs hosting
  • blade.org    Trade group for blade servers
  • bladelogic.com    Server management and discovery software
  • BladeNetwork.net    Server and storage blades (Bought by IBM)
  • Bladeroom    Data center and hosting
  • bladesystems.org    Industry trade group for blade servers and storage
  • bladetechnologies.net    Networking technologies
  • blockbridge.com    Elastic Storage Software and Tools
  • bluearc.com    High performance NAS enterprise class storage (Bought by HDS)
  • bluecoat.com    WAN optimization
  • bluecorenetworks.com    Networking infrastructure solutions
  • Bluehost    Web hosting, dedicated and virtual private servers
  • bluelock.com    Hosting, managed service and cloud provider
  • BlueOSS    Cloud and business inteligence solutions
  • www.bluestripe.com     Software for managing virtual data centers
  • bmc.com    Storage management software
  • bocada.com    Backup and management software
  • bowindustries.com    Tape media cleaning tools
  • box.net    Internet/web/cloud storage services
  • bphx.com    Legacy application transformation
  • bridgestor.com    Data reduction and storage optimization
  • Bridghead.com    Storage management software
  • broadband.com    Portal site for finding network bandwidth services
  • broadbandreports.com    Portal site for finding high speed internet access
  • broadcom.com    Storage networking component supplier
  • brocade.com    Switches, WAN gateways, software
  • brouwerconsultancy.com    Storage consultancy service
  • bswd.com    Brian Berg’s Storage Cornucopia web site
  • btiphotonics.com    WDM and Optical networking technologies
  • buffalotech.com    SMB and SOHO NAS storage
  • bustech.com    IBM Mainframe to open systems gateways (Bought by EMC)
  • bycast.com    Grid based fixed content, archive and object storage (Bought by NetApp)
  • c2c.com    Email archiving solutions
  • c2esoft.com    Data center operations and insight management tools
  • ca.com    Data management software
  • Computer Associates    Various data center, DCIM, data protection and other solution tools
  • call-recall.com    Optical storage
  • Canonical   Ubuntu Linux
  • carbonite.com    Cloud storage and backup
  • caringo.com    CAS archiving and object storage tools
  • casecentral.com    Cloud ediscovery
  • cassandra.apache.org    Data management and database alternative software
  • Apache Cassandra    NOSql Data Management tools
  • cassat.com    IRM management tools (Bought by CA)
  • Catalogic Software    Data protection and management tools
  • cataphora.com    Data management tools
  • catbird.com    VM security tools
  • caviumnetworks.com    Networking processors and chip technologies
  • cdproject.net    Carbon Disclosure Project
  • cdrive.com    VAR
  • cdw.com    VAR
  • celion.com    Network services for storage over distance
  • celona.com    Data migration tools
  • cemaphore.com    Messaging solutions
  • centos.org    Cluster Storage
  • centrepath.com    Storage management solutions (formerly Giant Loop)
  • centrify.com    Digital rights management for cloud, virtual, server, desktop and storage
  • Tier3/CenturyLink   Cloud, hosting and managed services
  • Centurylinkg/Savvis    Cloud and hosting solutions
  • Ceph   Cloud and object storage solutions
  • cert.org    Internet Security information
  • certesnetworks.com    Cloud security tools
  • certon.com    VAR
  • CFN Services    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • chelsio.com    High speed Ethernet adapters
  • chicorporation.com    Data protection, cloud and storage VAR
  • ciena.com    Optical networking
  • Cinenet    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • ciphermax.com    Data Storage Encryption Tools
  • cipheroptics.com    Storage networking security
  • ciprico.com    Storage systems (Bought by DotHill)
  • cirrustore.com    Backup data protection tools
  • cirtas.com    Cloud Storage Appliance – Added 6/9/10
  • cisco.com    Switches, WAN and Optical networking
  • Citrix.com    Virtualization solutions
  • ClearDB.com/.com    Local and distributed (GEO) MySQL database software and service
  • clearpace.com/.com    Large scale archive and data management tools
  • CleverSafe.com    Distributed object/esrasure storage
  • climatesaverscomputing.com    Green computing industry trade group
  • Clonix   Data cloning, duplication and protection tools
  • CloudByte   Scale-out and cloud storage
  • cloudera.com    Hadoop data storage and analytics tools
  • CloudFlare   CDN and Web Cache solutions
  • cloudfuzion.com    High performance servers
  • Cloudian   Cloud and object storage tools
  • Cloudphysics   Big data and virtualization tools
  • cloudreplica.com    Cloud data protection tools
  • cloudscaling.com    Open cloud platforms
  • Apache CloudStack   Open Source Cloud tools
  • cloudtp.com    Open cloud deployment solutions
  • CloudVelocity   Hybrid Cloud and data protection management solutins
  • cloverleafcomm.com    Storage Virtualization tools (Bought by DotHill)
  • clustrix.com    Storage software startup
  • cmg.org    Computer Measurement Group
  • cnt.com    Switches, WAN gateways, software (Bought by McData bought by Brocade)
  • Cobalt Iron   Data protection tools
  • code42.com    Cloud storage and backup aka Crashplan
  • Codenomicon.com    Data and security tools
  • cofio.com    Backup and data protection tools
  • CohesiveFT   Cloud solution and management tools
  • colliercomputing.com    VAR
  • colo-america.com    Co-location and hosting services

  • communities.vmware.com    VMware community
  • commvault.com    Data management software
  • comodo.com    Encryption tools
  • Comparitech    Consumer tech reviews
  • compellent.com    SMB Storage sub-systems and software – (Bought by Dell)
  • comptia.org    Computer and Technology Industry Association
  • compucom.com    VAR
  • computergamedesign.org    Computer game design
  • compuverde.com    Big data management tools and object storage
  • compuware.com    IT management and performance tools
  • condre.com    VAR/distributor
  • Condusiv   Data and storage management tools including Diskeeper
  • XO Communications    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • Connected Cloud    Cloud management tools
  • connectwise.com    IT automation tools
  • conres.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • consiliant.com    VAR
  • ConstantData.com    Real time data replication and mirroring
  • continuitysoftware.com    Replication and Snapshot data protection management
  • convirture.com    Cloud and virtualization tools
  • copansys.com    Secondary storage for backup and archiving (Assets Bought by SGI)
  • coraid.com    SATA over Ethernet storage
  • CoreSite    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • corevault.com    Cloud services
  • Cormant    DCIM and data center and infrastructure management tools
  • corning.com    Fiber optic cabling
  • corsair.com    SSD
  • corvis.com    Networking solutions
  • cPanel    Web, cloud and hosting management tools
  • crashplan.com    Cloud storage and backup aka Code42
  • creekpath.com    Storage management software
  • www.critical-links.com    Office in a box
  • crossroads.com    Storage routers and data protection management tools
  • Crosswalkinc.com    Clustered NAS storage (Ceased Operations)
  • crucial.com    Memory and SSD solutions
  • cru-dataport.com    Data Archive solutions
  • Crypto.com    Crypto resource site
  • www.ctera.com    Cloud storage appliance
  • Cumulus Networks    Open networking
  • curtisssd.com    SSD solution provider
  • cya.com    Document management and data protection
  • cyber-ark.com    Security data protection tools
  • cypress.com    Storage and networking components
  • dantz.com    Data protection and backup solutions (Aka Retrospect Bought by EMC, EMC sold off)
  • datacentertechnologies.com    Data management solutions (Bought by Symantec)
  • datacore.com    Storage management software
  • datadepositbox.com    Online backup and data protection
  • datadirectnetworks.com    Aka DDN Storage systems, SAN, NAS, Object and cloud
  • datadomain.com    Data Deduplication System (Bought by EMC)
  • Data Dynamics Inc    StorageX Data Movement, Migration and management
  • datafort.com    Online cloud backup
  • dataglobal.com    Data and storage management
  • Data Gravity    Big Data solutions
  • datagres.com    Cloud and application caching acceleration
  • dataguise.com/    Data security solutions
  • datalink.com    VAR
  • datallegro.com    Data warehouse storage solution (Bought by Microsoft)
  • datamirror.com    Data replication solutions
  • DataON Storage    Storage solutions
  • Datapipe    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • dataprotection.com    Vaultlogix data protection tools for cloud
  • DataRAM.com    SSD solutions
  • Data sales    Storage systems sales and leasing
  • dataslide.com    Hard rectangular disk (HRD)
  • datastor.com    Windows based backup data protection
  • datcollaborative.org    Data collaboration group and DAPL material
  • datoptic.com    Storage VAR
  • daymarksi.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • DBR360    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • ddifrontline.com    Security and access control
  • debian.org    Open source operating system
  • Debriefing software    Storage SRM tools
  • decru.com    Storage networking security solutions (Bought by NetApp)
  • Asempra.com    Data protection bought by Dell via Quest
  • dell.com    Storage networking equipment
  • Delphix    Storage, data management and data protection tools
  • demandtechnology.com    Demand technology software (performance software)
  • Denodo    Data virtualization tools
  • dexrexgear .com    Social media cloud storage
  • www.dey-sys.com    Open source software based sotrage
  • www.dh2i.com    Database virtualization software tools
  • digidata.com    Storage solutions
  • digistoresolutions.com    Archiving and data protection solutions
  • Digitalocular.com     Video data management tools
  • digitalreefinc.com    eDiscovery and compliance tools
  • digitiliti.com    Cloud and managed service backup
  • diligent.com    Virtual Tape Library (VTL) and Dedupe (Bought by IBM)
  • dimensiondata.com    VAR
  • Dimension Data    Hosting and managed services
  • dincloud.com    Cloud virtual desktop
  • directtextbook.com    Online book venue
  • discoverybox.net    Data protection for legal hold and compliance
  • diskkeeper.com    File and disk storage defragmentation (Condusiv)
  • Disklace.com    Disk storage optimization tools
  • dlink.com    Storage, network and cloud technologies
  • dmtf.org    Distributed Management Task Force
  • dnfstorage.com    iSCSI and hybrid storage (formerly Stonefly)
  • dothill.com    Distributed storage solutions
  • Doubletake.com    Data replication software
  • driveoncloud.com    Cloud drive online storage
  • drivesaversdatarecovery.com    Data protection and recovery
  • drobo.com    SMB and SOHO NAS storage
  • dropbox.com    Cloud storage and file sharing
  • druva.com    Backup, Storage, network and cloud technologies
  • dsireusa.org    Database of State Incentives and Renewable Energy
  • Dundas    Data Visualization and mobile dashboards
  • dvs.de    Digital video systems and storage
  • dynamicsolutions.com    Storage and data protection VAR
  • EaseUS    Backup, data protection and cloning tools
  • ecctek.com    Rugged data storage components
  • econnectix.com    Data and storage management solutions
  • eds.com    Data outsourcing and cloud provider (Bought by HP)
  • eere.energy.gov     U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) web site
  • egenera.com    Blade server and server virtualization management software
  • eginnovations.com    Application and infrastructure monitoring
  • egnyte.com    Cloud backup and data protection
  • eia.doe.gov/fuelelectric.html    Portal for electrical power generation, use and costs
  • emc.com    Storage sub-systems software
  • Emerson.com    DCIM IT Data center power, cooling and environmental management tools
  • Empired FlexScale    IT and business cloud solutions
  • emprisanetworks.com    Network management solutions (Bought by BMC)
  • emulex.com    Host bus adapters and embedded switches
  • enclarity.com    Healthcare CRM and analysis tools
  • encryptstick.com    USB based encryption device
  • enduradata.com    Data distribution and protection
  • energycenter.org    California Center for Sustainable Energy
  • energyshop.com    Portal for energy pricing and options
  • energystar.gov    United States EPA Energy Star web site
  • Enhance-tech.com    Storage VAR
  • enmotus.com    SSD storage tiering technology
  • Ensim   IT and cloud provisioning/management tools
  • enstratus.com    Amazon cloud computing management tools (Bought by Dell)
  • enterprisedb.com    Enterprise Database tools
  • epeat.net    Site for comparing desktop and related products
  • epic.com    Medical Information Technology software
  • equallogic.com    iSCSI storage systems (Bought by Dell)
  • Equinix, Inc.    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • equivio.com    Email data protection and retention
  • ericom.com    Desktop and VDI tools
  • esilicon.com    ASIC and custom silicon development
  • essextec.com    VAR
  • Eucalyptus    Open source cloud solutions
  • Evault.com    aka i365 – Remote (Cloud) backup service provider (Bought by Seagate)
  • Everspin Technologies    MRAM memories
  • evolvingsol.com    VAR
  • evostor.com    Storage startup
  • exablade.com    High performance application acceleration
  • Exablox    SMB storage solutions
  • Exabyte.com    Removable tape and robotics
  • exagrid.com    Backup Storage
  • exanet.com    Clustered NAS Storage (Bought by Dell aka FluidFileSystem)
  • exar.com    Server, Storage and Networking components
  • exavio.com    HD and SD data capture
  • exludus.com    Multi core optimize
  • Expand.com    Network and WAN optimization
  • Expertanalyticalsystems.com    Storage analysis tools
  • Exponential-e Ltd.    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • expresscomputersystems.com    Storage solutions VAR
  • extremenetworks.com    Networking switches

Where To Learn More

View additional NAS, NVMe, SSD, NVM, SCM, Data Infrastructure and HDD related topics via the following links.

Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

What This All Means

Visit the following additional data infrastructure and IT data center related links.

Links A-E
Links F-J
Links K-O
Links P-T
Links U-Z
Other Links

Ok, nuff said, for now.

Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

Posted on

Data Infrastructure IT Industry Related Resource Links F to J

Data Infrastructure IT Industry Related Resource Links F to J

IT Data Center and Data Infrastructure Industry Resources

Updated 2/20/2018

Following are some useful Data Infrastructure IT Industry Resource Links F to J to cloud, virtual and traditional IT data infrastructure related web sites. The data infrastructure environment (servers, storage, IO and networking, hardware, software, services, virtual, container and cloud) is rapidly changing. You may encounter a missing URL, or a URL that has changed. This list is updated on a regular basis to reflect changes (additions, changes, and retirement).

Disclaimer and note: URL’s submitted for inclusion on this site will be reviewed for consideration and to be in generally accepted good taste in regards to the theme of this site.

Best effort has been made to validate and verify the data infrastructure URLs that appear on this page and web site however they are subject to change. The author and/or maintainer(s) of this page and web site make no endorsement to and assume no responsibility for the URLs and their content that are listed on this page.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

Send an email note to info at storageio dot com that includes company name, URL, contact name, title and phone number along with a brief 40 character description to be considered for addition to the above data infrastructure list, or, to be removed. Note that Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC (e.g. StorageIO) does not sell, trade, barter, borrow or share your contact information per our Privacy and Disclosure policy. View related data infrastructure Server StorageIO content here, and signup for our free newsletter here.

Links A-E
Links F-J
Links K-O
Links P-T
Links U-Z
Other Links

  • f5.com    Networking solutions
  • fabric7.com    High speed networking
  • falconstor.com    Storage management software
  • FarStone.com    Backup and data protection software
  • fcoe.com    Web site pertaining to Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE)
  • fdr.com    Aka Innovation data protection tools
  • fedoraproject.org    Linux based operating system
  • Fiber Internet Center    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • FiberLight    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • fibrechannel.org    Fibre Channel Trade Group
  • filenet.com    File Management Solutions
  • FilesX.com    Backup and data protection software (Bought by IBM)
  • filetek.com    Data management solutions (Bought by SGI)
  • finisar.com    Test, Diagnostic, and Optic Transceivers
  • firescope.com    DCIM, IRM, PMDB, CMDB data solutions
  • First Communications    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • Firewall Technical    AWS Desktop, Server and Network Support
  • flashsoft.com    SSD cache software (Bought by SANdisk)
  • Flexiant    Cloud management tools
  • flexstar.com    Hardware testing equipment
  • FNT Software    Data Center and DCIM software tools
  • Folder Sizes    Disk Space Management software tools
  • force10.com    High speed networking (Bought by Dell)
  • forsythe.com    VAR
  • foundrynetworks.com    Networking switches (Bought by Brocade)
  • FreeNAS    ZFS based NAS storage software
  • frety.com    Site with links to various technologies
  • fueleconomy.gov    US Government site for energy efficiency
  • fujifilm.com    Data storage tape media
  • Fujitsu.com    Computers, disks, storage
  • fujitsu-siemens.com    Storage, VTL, storage management solutions
  • fulcrummicro.com    10Gb and high performance chips and cross bars
  • fusionio.com    PCIe based NAND/FLASH local SSD for internal server attachment
  • ioturbine.com    IO optimization driver software (Bought by FusionIO)
  • fusionstorm.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • FutureMark    PC Benchmarking and testing tools (PCMark and others)
  • gear6.com    Data performance acceleration NAS caching appliance (Bought by Violin)
  • Geist Global    Data Center and DCIM tools
  • geminare.com    Cloud and application migration and recovery tools
  • genie-soft.com    Backup and data protection tools
  • genstor.com    Storage solutions
  • gfi.com    SMB Email security and data protection
  • gigaspace.com    Grid application and data management middle ware
  • gladinet.com    Cloud storage access software
  • Global Capacity    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • globalstor.com    Data storage solutions
  • glodynetechnoserve.com    IT Management tools
  • gluster.com    Open source clustered file system (Bought by Redhat)
  • gogrid.com    Cloud IaaS and hosting services
  • goldengate.com    Data protection and management software (Bought by Oracle)
  • goodsync.com    Data protection solutions
  • Google    Various cloud services including Google Drive, Documents and others
  • graudata.com    Archive software tools
  • Gravitant    Cloud brokerage and management tools
  • green-bytes.com    ZFS based storage management solutions
  • Greenfield Software    DCIM software tools
  • greenliant.com    Nand flash SSD for embedded solutions
  • greenplum.com    Data warehouse storage solutions (Bought by EMC)
  • greenracksystems.com    VAR
  • gresham-storage.com    Virtual tape solutions (VTL sold to Tributary)
  • GridGain    in memory computing
  • gridironsystems.com    Big data and high performance appliance storage
  • gridstore.com    Clustered NAS storage
  • Global Telecom Technology, Inc. (GTT)    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • Apache Hadoop    Hadoop Big Data Tools
  • hastorage.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • www.hddfiresafe.com    Fire proof and water resistant storage systems
  • hds.com    Storage sub-systems and software
  • hermes-softlab.com    IT and virtualization software
  • Hibernia Atlantic    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • hifn.com    Optimization technology (Bought by Exar)
  • high-rely.com    Removable storage solutions
  • hi-stor.com    VAR
  • hitachigst.com    Hitachi Global Storage Technologies – Disk drives (Bought by WD)
  • Hotlink    Data protection, cloud and virtualization management tools
  • hp.com    Storage networking hardware and software
  • htch.com    Hutchinson technologies – disk drive components
  • huawei.com    Networking technologies
  • hydrastor.com    Multi-tenant clustered storage (NEC)
  • hyper9.com    Virtualization management tools (aka Inovawave)
  • hyperio.com    Storage and I/O performance monitoring for Windows
  • hytrust.com    Virtual infrastructure security tools
  • Hyve Solutions   Open Compute Project Servers and Storage
  • i365.com    Online cloud backup (Bought by Seagate e.g. Evault)

  • i3-groep.nl    Dutch ICT VAR
  • iarchive.com    Value added reseller (VAR)
  • iBackup    Online and cloud backup service
  • ibm.com    Storage networking hardware and software
  • Ibrix.com    Clustered and cloud storage software (Bought by HP)
  • Iceweb.com    Data storage solutions
  • icorps.com    IT outsourcing and consulting services
  • IDRIVE    Cloud storage backup
  • idt.com    Server, storage, memory, networking components
  • ieee.org    Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
  • ietf.org    Internet Engineering Task Force
  • iland    Cloud and virtualization services tools
  • illumita.com    IT Cloud solutions
  • Imation.com    Removable media, primary and archive storage (Bought Nexsan)
  • imperva.com    Data protection tools
  • imtpartners.com    Storage TCO modeling tool
  • Inboxer.com    Email and compliance risk management tools
  • Incentra.com    VAR (Bought by Datalink)
  • incipient.com    Storage management and virtualization (Assets bought by TMS)
  • indexengines.com    eDiscovery, search, indexing, classification
  • infineta.com    WAN optimization
  • infinibandta.org    InfiniBand Trade Organization
  • infinicon.com    InfiniBand Technology
  • Infinio    VMware NAS I/O acceleration cache
  • infinityio.com    Storage networking training
  • infocachecorp.com    Data discovery solutions VAR
  • InfoGuard.com    Data security solutions
  • infology.net    eDiscovery
  • Infortrend.com    RAID controllers
  • infostor.com    Magazine focused on storage and storage networking
  • infostreet.com    Cloud Desktop tools
  • Inktank    Ceph services
  • inmage.com    Data protection appliance
  • innovationdp.com    Data management software
  • inoc.com    Network Operations Center (NOC) service
  • Inovawave.com    Virtualization management tools (aka Hyper9)
  • Inphase-technologies.com    Holographic storage
  • inquinox.com    Data, dedupe and data protection management tools
  • inrange.com    Storage Networking Formerly Dataswitch (Bought by CNT Bought by McData Bought by Brocade)
  • insight.com    Value Added Reseller (VAR)
  • insynchq.com    Cloud storage, document sharing
  • intel.com    Host adapters and chips
  • intelipathsolutions.com    Virtual network connectivity (Aka Onpath)
  • intellimagic.net    Server performance, resource management software
  • IntelliProp    SAS and SATA storage
  • InterCloud    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • intermedia.net.com    Exchange email hosting service
  • Intermine.com    Storage management software
  • Internap.com    Cloud, managed services, hosting and colo
  • interscapetech.com    Cloud and storage tools / services
  • InterSOC.com    Security management tools
  • intersystems.com    Medical Information Technology software
  • intradyn.com    Storage and data protection for SMB (Part of Sony)
  • intransa.com    iSCSI storage
  • Intronis.com    Online, managed and cloud backup solutions
  • iolo.com    Desktop tuneup, protection tools
  • iomega.com    SMB iSCSI, NAS and other storage (Bought by EMC, Partnering with Lenovo)
  • iometer.org    Iometer performance benchmarking tool
  • Ion Computer    Server, storage and data center solutions
  • iosafe.com    Rugged and fire proof, water proof storage
  • IP Fabrics    SDN switch
  • iphouse.com    MSP, hosting and cloud services
  • iqstor.com    Storage for SMB environments
  • iri.com    Big data management tools
  • CoSort Company IRI    Data management and protection tools
  • ironmountain.com    Data archive, managed and cloud services
  • ironspeed.com    Mobile database tools
  • iSecure    Internet security and forensics services
  • isilon.com    Shared storage – (Bought by EMC)
  • iso.org    International Standards Organizations
  • iStor.com    iSCSI storage
  • IT-ERNITY    Data center and hosting services
  • ivivity.com    Storage virtualization technology
  • iwavesoftware.com    Heterogeneous storage automation software
  • ixia.com    Fibre Channel test equipment
  • IX Reach    AWS connect parter, Hosting/cloud/access services
  • ixsight.com    IT and IRM/SRA insight and data migration
  • JAM Software    Treesize SRM including for NAS
  • jdsu.com    Storage networking optics
  • Jeda Networks    Software defined network and storage management
  • jedec.org    Joint Electron Device Engineering Council
  • jmr.com    Storage systems
  • jni.com    Host bus adapters
  • joyent.com    Cloud infrasture tools
  • jumpbox.com    VM virtual appliance hosting
  • jumpbox.com    Virtualization solutions
  • jungledisk.com    Cloud storage, backup file sharing
  • juniper.net    Networking technologies

Where To Learn More

View additional NAS, NVMe, SSD, NVM, SCM, Data Infrastructure and HDD related topics via the following links.

Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

What This All Means

Visit the following additional data infrastructure and IT data center related links.

Links A-E
Links F-J
Links K-O
Links P-T
Links U-Z
Other Links

Ok, nuff said, for now.

Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

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Data Infrastructure IT Industry Related Resource Links to Others

Data Infrastructure IT Industry Related Resource Links to Others

IT Data Center and Data Infrastructure Industry Resources

Updated 2/20/2018

Following are some useful Data Infrastructure IT Industry Resource Links to cloud, virtual and traditional IT data infrastructure related web sites. The data infrastructure environment (servers, storage, IO and networking, hardware, software, services, virtual, container and cloud) is rapidly changing. You may encounter a missing URL, or a URL that has changed. This list is updated on a regular basis to reflect changes (additions, changes, and retirement).

Disclaimer and note: URL’s submitted for inclusion on this site will be reviewed for consideration and to be in generally accepted good taste in regards to the theme of this site.

Best effort has been made to validate and verify the data infrastructure URLs that appear on this page and web site however they are subject to change. The author and/or maintainer(s) of this page and web site make no endorsement to and assume no responsibility for the URLs and their content that are listed on this page.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

Send an email note to info at storageio dot com that includes company name, URL, contact name, title and phone number along with a brief 40 character description to be considered for addition to the above data infrastructure list, or, to be removed. Note that Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC (e.g. StorageIO) does not sell, trade, barter, borrow or share your contact information per our Privacy and Disclosure policy. View related data infrastructure Server StorageIO content here, and signup for our free newsletter here.

Links A-E
Links F-J
Links K-O
Links P-T
Links U-Z
Other Links

  • www.10gea.org    10Gb Ethernet industry trade organization
  • www.1394ta.org    1394 (Firewire) trade association
  • www.3com.com    Networking equipment (Bought by HP)
  • www.3leafnetworks.com    I/O virtualization
  • www.3par.com    Clustered storage systems (Bought by HP)
  • www.3tera.com    IT Cloud management tools (Bought by CA)
  • www.4blox.com    Data center design services
  • www.4blox.com    Linux iSCSI target optimization stack
  • www.4bridgeworks.com aka Bridgeworks    SAN networking and connectivity solutions
  • www.80plus.org    Energy efficient power supply trade group

Where To Learn More

View additional NAS, NVMe, SSD, NVM, SCM, Data Infrastructure and HDD related topics via the following links.

Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

What This All Means

Visit the following additional data infrastructure and IT data center related links.

Links A-E
Links F-J
Links K-O
Links P-T
Links U-Z
Other Links

Ok, nuff said, for now.

Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

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Some popular 2016 storageioblog posts

Some popular 2016 storageioblog posts

server storage I/O trends

Big Files and Lots of Little File Processing and Benchmarking with Vdbench – Need to test, validate, compare, contrast or simply apply workload to file systems, NAS or other file-based access? Want the flexibility and simplicity to software define your benchmark workload to meet various needs? For example, millions of small files or thousands of large 5GB, 10GB, 15GB (or larger) files with various read, write size and access patterns spanning a single directory, or many with various depths? Do you want the flexibility for different platforms including Windows, *NIX, bare metal, container, virtual or cloud without a bulk tool using simple scripts that produce lots of insightful results? Then you will want to check this post out.

Breaking the VMware ESXi 5.5 ACPI boot loop on Lenovo TD350 – Ever have a VMware host server go into a boot loop and purple screen of death (PSD) then displaying a message about ACPI or similar? After spending time searching and applying many filters to sift through the noise of false positive matches, finally found the simple fix (e.g. a BIOS setting) to break the VMware ESXi vSphere boot loop, or at least on a Lenovo server.

Cloud and Object Storage

Cloud conversations: AWS EBS, Glacier and S3 overview (Part I) – This is one of the perennial favorites that while new features have been added with others extended, the post series still provides a good overview, primer or refresher of various Amazon Web Services (AWS) services including how they work. Interesting in learning more about Microsoft and Azure, then check out this, this, this and this.

Cloud Conversations: AWS EFS Elastic File System (Cloud NAS) – This is a companion to the above AWS as well as other cloud post series that looks at AWS Elastic File System. Note that other cloud service providers have also added NAS file access support, some are intra (e.g. inside AWS cloud), others are inter-cloud (e.g. inside and outside cloud) such as Azure (can work with external Windows Servers using SMB3). Even OpenStack has added NAS file with Manila folders and Ceph with CephFS among others. So when some people tell you that NAS and file access are dead particular for cloud, remind them of the increasing number of services and software stacks that are adding new services to allow their solution to be compatible with existing environments or applications.

Server Storage I/O performance

Collecting Transaction Per Minute from SQL Server and HammerDB – If you have used the free tool HammerDB (e.g. Hammora) for driving database workloads, simulations or benchmarks you should recall that the resulting statistics are rather lacking. Sure there is a nice GUI chart that shows current executing transactions per second (TPS) along with some very simple counters in the log. However compared to some other tools such as sysbench, Quest Benchmark Factory and YCSB among others, the Hammer metrics are rather lacking. In this post I show how you can collect some more metrics from SQL Server if you have to use HammerDB. View more server storage I/O performance benchmark and monitoring tools resources here.

Windows Server 2016

Gaining Server Storage I/O Insight into Microsoft Windows Server 2016 – Microsoft released into general availability Windows Server 2016 and this post looks at some of the new features along with functionality including Storage Spaces Direct (S2D), Storage Replica (SR) as well as other enhancements. With these new and enhanced features Windows Servers increase their interoperability with Azure, as well as supporting aggregated hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI), disaggregated converged (CI) as well as traditional workloads along with Hyper-V (and containers). One of the other new enhancements in Windows Server 2016 which now uses ReFS (Reliable File System) as its default file system that you can read more about here. RIP Windows SIS (Single Instance Storage), or at least in Server 2016 With Windows Server 2016 Microsoft removed single instance storage replacing with new capabilities that you can read more about in the this post.

Garbage data in garbage data out

Garbage data in, garbage information out, big data or big garbage? There is a classic IT expression of garbage data in results in garbage data (or information out) in that your algorithms and data structures (which equals programs e.g. Niklaus Wirth) are only as good as the data they work on. What this means then is that if there is a large amount of big data then there can also be a big garbage in and garbage out problem unless addressed.

Hard product vs. soft product – Hard product refers to something such as hardware, software or a service resource that is obtained and then joined with other resources in a particular way to create a soft product. Not to be confused with software, the soft product is the result or how resources get defined that give some ability or benefit. Think of a soft product as for how airlines can use the same airplane, serve the same coca cola, have same seats, yet their soft product is the service experience of how those are delivered, as well as how you find and buy or use them. Another way of thinking about it is hard products are the ingredients for a recipe, the recipe defines how those ingredients result in some food dish.

how many IOPs can an HDD or SSD do

Part II: How many IOPS can a HDD, HHDD or SSD do with VMware? – This is part of a multi-post series looking at how many IOPs (or bandwidth) various HDD and SSDs can do handling different workloads. Of course, your results will vary with configuration settings, tools among other considerations. However, some of the older rules of thumb (RUT) about RPM and other considerations for HDDs have changed and continue to do so. As an example of how HDDs continue to evolve check out this popular post from the 2016 list Which Enterprise HDDs to use for a Content Server Platform.

Part II: What I did with Lenovo TS140 in my Server and Storage I/O Review – This is a popular post series of some things I have done with a Lenovo TS140 including defining with various software as well as hardware. This is a great price performer value system that several years ago after testing one Lenovo sent me, I returned that to Lenovo and bought several of them to join my other systems.

Server and Storage I/O Benchmarking and Performance Resources – This is a collection of various server, storage I/O and networking hardware, software as well as services tools, techniques as well as tips for benchmarking, comparing, simulation, testing, gaining insight across cloud, virtual, container and legacy resources. Server and Storage I/O Benchmark Tools: Microsoft Diskspd (Part I) – This is one of the tools found on the server, storage I/O benchmarking and performance resources page. Diskspd is a tool developed by Microsoft as an alternative to using Iometer, vdbench, fio.exe, SQLIO among many others, plus, it is on github.

server storage I/O nvme and ssd

The NVM (Non Volatile Memory) and NVMe Place – Interesting and adoption in nand flash, nvram, 3D XPoint among other SSD and Non-volatile Memory (NVM) continues. Another popular post that you can find at thenvmeplace.com is this NVMe overview and primer – Part I. There is a growing interest, awareness and deployment adoption around NVM Express (NVMe) the new protocol for accessing NVMs and SSDs. Some of the common conversations and questions I encounter is confusion between NVM and NVMe, too which the answer is one (the former) are the media or devices, the other is the access method alternative to using AHCI/SATA or SCSI (e.g. SAS, iSCSI, FCP, SRP) among others.

VMware VVOLs and storage I/O fundamentals (Part 1) – VMware Virtual Volumes (VVOL) continue to gain adoption and this post is part of an overview and primer. If you want to go deeper into VVOL as well as see some adoption insights check out Eric Sieberts post here over at vsphere-land.com

Welcome to the Object Storage Center page – This is a micro site that has a primer and overview of cloud as well as object storage along with an expanding list of links to various resources, tips, technologies, tools, trends and industry activity.

Where To Learn More

www.storageio.com particular if you have not been there for awhile to check out the new streamlined look and navigation to various content including Server StorageIO update newsletters (free subscription) among other resources.

Additional learning experiences along with common questions (and answers), as well as tips can be found in Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials book.

Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials Book SDDC

What this all means and wrapping up

Some of the popular posts for 2016 are perennial favorites and based on experience will probably appear on the 2017 list. However there are also several new posts that appeared in 2016 that I suspect will also appear on the 2017 version of the above list, along with new content from 2017.

Thank you to all of you who frequent StorageIOblog.com as well as StorageIO.com along with our various micro sites including server storage I/O performance and benchmarking resources, thenvmeplace.com, thessdplace.com, cloud and objectstoragecenter.com, data protection diaries among others.

Also thank you for viewing various partner venues and syndicates with extra ones appearing throughout 2017. Watch for more content in the coming weeks, months and throughout 2017 on software defined data infrastructures (SDDI) along with server, storage I/O, networking, hardware, software, cloud, container, data protection and related topics, trends, technologies, tools and tips.

Again, thank you

Ok, nuff said, for now.

Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, VMware vExpert 2010-2017 (vSAN and vCloud). Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Courteous comments are welcome for consideration. First published on https://storageioblog.com any reproduction in whole, in part, with changes to content, without source attribution under title or without permission is forbidden.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO. All Rights Reserved. StorageIO is a registered Trade Mark (TM) of Server StorageIO.

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SSD, flash, Non-volatile memory (NVM) storage Trends, Tips & Topics

SSD, flash, Non-volatile memory (NVM) storage Trends, Tips & Topics

Updated 2/2/2018

server storage I/O trends

Will 2017 be there year of solid state device (SSD), all flash, or all Non-volatile memory (NVM) based storage data centers and data infrastructures?

Recently I did a piece over at InfoStor looking at SSD trends, tips and related topics. SSDs of some type, shape and form are in your future, if they are not already. In my InfoStor piece, I look at some non-volatile memory (NVM) and SSD trends, technologies, tools and tips that you can leverage today to help prepare for tomorrow. This also includes NVM Express (NVMe) based components and solutions.

By way of background, SSD can refer to solid state drive or solid state device (e.g. more generic). The latter is what I am using in this post. NVM refers to different types of persistent memories, including NAND flash and its variants most commonly used today in SSDs. Other NVM mediums include NVRAM along with storage class memories (SCMs) such as 3D XPoint and phase change memory (PCM) among others. Let’s focus on NAND flash as that is what is primarily available and shipping for production enterprise environments today.

Continue reading about SSD, flash, NVM and related trends, topics and tips over at InfoStor by clicking here.

Where To Learn More

Additional related content can be found at:

What This All Means

Will 2017 finally be the year of all flash, all SSD and all NVM including emerging storage class memories (SCM)? Or as we have seen over the past decade increasing adoption as well as deployment in most environments, some of which have gone all SSD or NVM. In the meantime it is safe to say that NVMe, NVM, SSD, flash and other related technologies are in your future in some shape or form as well as quantity. Check out my piece over at InfoStor SSD trends, tips and related topics.

What say you, are you going all flash, SSD or NVM in 2017, if not, what are your concerns or constraints and plans?

Ok, nuff said, for now…

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, vSAN and VMware vExpert. Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and <a “https://storageioblog.com/book1”>Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio. Watch for the spring 2017 release of his new book “Software-Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials” (CRC Press).

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Cloud and Object storage are in your future, what are some questions?

Cloud and Object storage are in your future, what are some questions?

server storage I/O trends

IMHO there is no doubt that cloud and object storage are in your future, what are some questions?

Granted, what type of cloud and object storage or service along with for work or entertainment are some questions.

Likewise, what are your cloud and object storage concerns (assuming you already have heard the benefits)?

Some other questions include when, where for different applications workload needs, as well as how and with what among others.

Keep in mind that there are many aspects to cloud storage and they are not all object, likewise, there are many facets to object storage.

Recently I did a piece over at InfoStor titled Cloud Storage Concerns, Considerations and Trends that looks at the above among other items including:

  • Is cloud storage cheaper than traditional storage?
  • How do you access cloud object storage from legacy block and file applications?
  • How do you implement on-site cloud storage?
  • Is enterprise file sync and share (EFSS) safe and secure?
  • Does cloud storage need to be backed up and protected?
  • What geographic location requirements or regulations apply to you?

When it comes to cloud computing and, in particular, cloud storage, context matters. Conversations are necessary to discuss concerns, as well as discuss various considerations, options and alternatives. People often ask me questions about the best cloud storage to use, concerns about privacy, security, performance and cost.

Some of the most common cloud conversations topics involve context :

  • Public, private or hybrid cloud; turnkey subscription service or do it yourself (DIY)?
  • Storage, compute server, networking, applications or development tools?
  • Storage application such as file sync and share like Dropbox?
  • Storage resources such as table, queues, objects, file or block?
  • Storage for applications in the cloud, on-site or hybrid?

Continue reading Cloud Storage Concerns, Considerations and Trends over at InfoStor.

Where To Learn More

Additional related content can be found at:

What This All Means

As I mentioned above, cloud and object storage are in your future, granted your future may not rely on just cloud or object storage. Take a few minutes to check out some of the conversation topics, tips and trends in my piece over at InfoStor Cloud Storage Concerns, Considerations and Trends along with more material at www.objectstoragecenter.com.

Btw, what are your questions, comments, concerns, claims or caveats as part of cloud and object storage conversations?

Ok, nuff said, for now…

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, vSAN and VMware vExpert. Author of Software Defined Data Infrastructure Essentials (CRC Press), as well as Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press), Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio.

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Gaining Server Storage I/O Insight into Microsoft Windows Server 2016

Server Storage I/O Insight into Microsoft Windows Server 2016

server storage I/O trends
Updated 12/8/16

In case you had not heard, Microsoft announced the general availability (GA, also known as Release To Manufacturing (RTM) ) of the newest version of its Windows server operating system aka Windows Server 2016 along with System Center 2016. Note that as well as being released to traditional manufacturing distribution mediums as well as MSDN, the Windows Server 2016 bits are also available on Azure.

Microsoft Windows Server 2016
Windows Server 2016 Welcome Screen – Source Server StorageIOlab.com

For some this might be new news, or a refresh of what Microsoft announced a few weeks ago (e.g. the formal announcement). Likewise, some of you may not be aware that Microsoft is celebrating WIndows Server 20th Birthday (read more here).

Yet for others who have participated in the public beta aka public technical previews (TP) over the past year or two or simply after the information coming out of Microsoft and other venues, there should not be a lot of surprises.

Whats New With Windows Server 2016

Microsoft Windows Server 2016 Desktop
Windows Server 2016 Desktop and tools – Source Server StorageIOlab.com

Besides a new user interface including visual GUI and Powershell among others, there are many new feature functionalities summarized below:

  • Enhanced time-server with 1ms accuracy
  • Nano and Windows Containers (Linux via Hyper-V)
  • Hyper-V enhanced Linux services including shielded VMs
  • Simplified management (on-premisess and cloud)
  • Storage Spaces Direct (S2D) and Storage Replica (SR) – view more here and here


Storage Replica (SR) Scenarios including synchronous and asynchronous – Via Microsoft.com

  • Resilient File System aka ReFS (now default file system) storage tiering (cache)
  • Hot-swap virtual networking device support
  • Reliable Change Tracking (RCT) for faster Hyper-V backups
  • RCT improves resiliency vs. VSS change tracking
  • PowerShell and other management enhancements
  • Including subordinated / delegated management roles
  • Compliment Azure AD with on premise AD
  • Resilient/HA RDS using Azure SQL DB for connection broker
  • Encrypted VMs (at rest and during live migration)
  • AD Federation Services (FS) authenticate users in LDAP dir.
  • vTPM for securing and encrypting Hyper-V VMs
  • AD Certificate Services (CS) increase support for TPM
  • Enhanced TPM support for smart card access management
  • AD Domain Services (DS) security resiliency for hybrid and mobile devices

Here is a Microsoft TechNet post that goes into more detail of what is new in WIndows Server 2016.

Free ebook: Introducing Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview (Via Microsoft Press)

Check out the above free ebook, after looking through it, I recommend adding it to your bookshelf. There are lots of good intro and overview material for Windows Server 2016 to get you up to speed quickly, or as a refresh.

Storage Spaces Direct (S2D) CI and HCI

Storage Spaces Direct (S2D) builds on Storage Spaces that appeared in earlier Windows and Windows Server editions. Some of the major changes and enhancements include ability to leverage local direct attached storage (DAS) such as internal (or external) dedicated NVMe, SAS and SATA HDDs as well as flash SSDs that used for creating software defined storage for various scenarios.

Scenarios include converged infrastructure (CI) disaggregated as well as aggregated hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) for Hyper-V among other workloads. Windows Server 2016 S2D nodes communicate (from a storage perspective) via a software storage bus. Data Protection and availability is enabled between S2D nodes via Storage Replica (SR) that can do software based synchronous and asynchronous replication.


Aggregated – Hyper-Converged Infrastructure (HCI) – Source Microsoft.com


Desegregated – Converged Infrastructure (CI) – Source Microsoft.com

The following is a Microsoft produced YouTube video providing a nice overview and insight into Windows Server 2016 and Microsoft Software Defined Storage aka S2D.




YouTube Video Storage Spaces Direct (S2D) via Microsoft.com

Server storage I/O performance

What About Performance?

A common question that comes up with servers, storage, I/O and software defined data infrastructure is what about performance?

Following are some various links to different workloads showing performance for Hyper-V, S2D and Windows Server. Note as with any benchmark, workload or simulation take them for what they are, something to compare that may or might not be applicable to your own workload and environments.

  • Large scale VM performance with Hyper-V and in-memory transaction processing (Via Technet)
  • Benchmarking Microsoft Hyper-V server, VMware ESXi and Xen Hypervisors (Via cisjournal PDF)
  • Server 2016 Impact on VDI User Experience (Via LoginVSI)
  • Storage IOPS update with Storage Spaces Direct (Via TechNet)
  • SQL Server workload (benchmark) Order Processing Benchmark using In-Memory OLTP (Via Github)
  • Setting up testing Windows Server 2016 and S2D using virtual machines (Via MSDN blogs)
  • Storage throughput with Storage Spaces Direct (S2D TP5 (Via TechNet)
  • Server and Storage I/O Benchmark Tools: Microsoft Diskspd (Part I)

Where To Learn More

For those of you not as familiar with Microsoft Windows Server and related topics, or that simply need a refresh, here are several handy links as well as resources.

  • Introducing Windows Server 2016 (Free ebook from Microsoft Press)
  • What’s New in Windows Server 2016 (Via TechNet)
  • Microsoft S2D Software Storage Bus (Via TechNet)
  • Understanding Software Defined Storage with S2D in Windows Server 2016 (Via TechNet)
  • Microsoft Storage Replica (SR) (Via TechNet)
  • Server and Storage I/O Benchmark Tools: Microsoft Diskspd (Part I)
  • Microsoft Windows S2D Software Defined Storage (Via TechNet)
  • Windows Server 2016 and Active Directory (Redmond Magazine Webinar)
  • Data Protection for Modern Microsoft Environments (Redmond Magazine Webinar)
  • Resilient File System aka ReFS (Via TechNet)
  • DISKSPD now on GitHub, and the mysterious VMFLEET released (Via TechNet)
  • Hyper-converged solution using Storage Spaces Direct in Windows Server 2016 (Via TechNet)
  • NVMe, SSD and HDD storage configurations in Storage Spaces Direct TP5 (Via TechNet)
  • General information about SSD at www.thessdplace.com and NVMe at www.thenvmeplace.com
  • How to run nested Hyper-V and Windows Server 2016 (Via Altaro and via MSDN)
  • How to run Nested Windows Server and Hyper-V on VMware vSphere ESXi (Via Nokitel)
  • Get the Windows Server 2016 evaluation bits here
  • Microsoft Azure Stack overview and related material via Microsoft
  • Introducing Windows Server 2016 (Via MicrosoftPress)
  • Various WIndows Server and S2D lab scripts (Via Github)
  • Storage Spaces Direct – Lab Environment Setup (Via Argon Systems)
  • Setting up S2D with a 4 node configuration (Via StarWind blog)
  • SQL Server workload (benchmark) Order Processing Benchmark using In-Memory OLTP (Via Github)
  • Setting up testing Windows Server 2016 and S2D here using virtual machines (Via MSDN blogs)
  • Hyper-V large-scale VM performance for in-memory transaction processing (Via Technet)
  • BrightTalk Webinar – Software-Defined Data Centers (SDDC) are in your Future (if not already here)
  • Microsoft TechNet: Understand the cache in Storage Spaces Direct
  • BrightTalk Weibniar – Software-Defined Data Infrastructures Enabling Software-Defined Data Centers
  • Happy 20th Birthday Windows Server, ready for Server 2016?
  • Server StorageIO resources including added links, tools, reports, events and more.

What This All Means

While Microsoft Windows Server recently celebrated its 20th birthday (or anniversary), a lot has changed as well as evolved. This includes Windows Servers 2016 supporting new deployment and consumption models (e.g. lightweight Nano, full data center with desktop interface, on-premises, bare metal, virtualized (Hyper-V, VMware, etc) as well as cloud). Besides how consumed and configured, which can also be for CI and HCI modes, Windows Server 2016 along with Hyper-V extend the virtualization and container capabilities into non-Microsoft environments specifically around Linux and Docker. Not only are the support for those environments and platforms enhanced, so to are the management capabilities and interfaces from Powershell to Bash Linux shell being part of WIndows 10 and Server 2016.

What this all means is that if you have not looked at Windows Server in some time, its time you do, even if you are not a WIndows or Microsoft fan, you will want to know what it is that has been updated (perhaps even update your fud if that is the case) to stay current. Get your hands on the bits and try Windows Server 2016 on a bare metal server, or as a VM guest, or via cloud including Azure, or simply leverage the above resources to learn more and stay informed.

Ok, nuff said, for now…

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Microsoft MVP Cloud and Data Center Management, vSAN and VMware vExpert. Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Happy 20th Birthday Microsoft Windows Server, get ready for Windows Server 2016

Happy 20th Birthday Windows Server, ready for Server 2016?

server storage I/O trends

In case you have not heard, Microsoft is celebrating the 20th birthday (or anniversary) of Windows Server.

Microsoft has a nice site with info graphics and timelines of where Windows Server has been and accomplished over the past 20 years (view here).

Some of you may remember from 20 years ago Windows Server with a different name aka Windows NT Server. Back in the day, if you recall (or read), server requirements were more in the 33 MHz vs. 3.3GHz range, 32MB of RAM Memory vs. 32GB to 320GB, 150MB HDD vs. 150GB SSD or 1.5TB HDD.

Keep in mind that 20 years ago Linux was a relative new thing with Red Hat not yet quite household or more specific enterprise name. The various Unix (e.g. IBM AIX, HP HP-UX, Sun Solaris, DEC Unix and Ultrix among many others) were still dominate, OS2 had peaked or close to, among others. Virtual Machines were Logical Partitions (LPAR) on Mainframes along with virtual PCs software and hardware assist boards.

IMHO there is no coincidence of Microsoft celebrating 20 years of WIndows Server going into the fall of 2016 and the upcoming release of Server 2016.

What’s New in Server 2016 (TP5)?

If you have not done so, check out the latest Tech Preview 5 (TP5) of Windows Server 2016 (get the bits e.g. software here to try) which includes Storage Spaces Direct (S2D) that leverages internal PCIe and drive format SSD (NVMe, SAS, SATA) along with HDDs (SAS, SATA) for creating local and scale-out converged (desegregated) and hyper-converged (aggregated) solutions. In addition to S2D there is Storage Replica (SR) which is replication of local storage part of S2D (not to be confused with DFS or other replication).

Other enhancements include ReFS as the default file system instead of NTFS (don’t worry, NTFS like FAT does not go away yet). There are enhancements to Hyper-V including VM shielding, hot-plug virtual network adapters, enhanced Linux support and fail over priorities among others. Other enhancements include updates for AD including improved integration with on-premises as well as Azure AD for hybrid environments, PowerShell updates, Docker management including Linux (via Hyper-V) and Windows via Nano) container engines.

Microsoft Windows Server 2016 TP5

Speaking of Nano, if you had not heard, this is a new very light weight Windows Kernel that removes 32 bit WOW and GUI support. The result is that Nano is a very small physical (under 1GB image instance size) using less disk, less memory and less CPU to do a given amount of work, oh, and boots super fast, even without SSD. By not having all the 32 bit and GUI overhead, the intent with Nano is there should be fewer updates and maintenance tasks to do, while enabling Windows containers for SQL Server and other applications.

In addition to PowerShell, AD and other management enhancements, Windows Server 2016 (TP5) also enables bridging two worlds e.g. traditional on-premises (or cloud) based Windows Server and Public Cloud (e.g. Azure) and Private or Hybrid including Azure Stack. Note that if you have not heard of Azure Stack and are looking at cloud stacks such as OpenStack, do your due diligence and at least familiarize yourself with Azure Stack.

View more about WIndows 2016 TP5 enhancements here.

Where To Learn More

What This All Means

Congratulations Microsoft and Windows Server on 20th birthday (anniversary) you have come a long way.

With the new features and functionality in Windows Server 2016, looks like there is still a good future for the software defined server.

Ok, nuff said, for now…

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (aka Xenial Xerus) What’s In The Bits and Bytes?

Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (aka Xenial Xerus) What’s In The Bits and Bytes?

server storage I/O trends

Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (aka Xenial Xerus) was recently released (you can get the bits or software download here). Ubuntu is available in various distributions including as a server, workstation or desktop among others that can run bare metal on a physical machine (PM), virtual machine (VM) or as a cloud instance via services such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) as well as Microsoft Azure among others.

Refresh, What is Ubuntu

For those not familiar or who need a refresh, Ubuntu is an open source Linux distribution with the company behind it called Canonical. The Ubuntu software is a Debian based Linux distribution with Unity (user interface). Ubuntu is available across different platform architecture from industry standard Intel and AMD x86 32bit and 64bit to ARM processors and even the venerable IBM zSeriues (aka zed) mainframe as part of LinuxOne.

As a desktop, some see or use Ubuntu as an open source alternative to desktop interfaces based on those from Microsoft such as Windows or Apple.

As a server Ubuntu can be deployed from traditional applications to cloud, converged and many others including as a docker container, Ceph or OpenStack deployment platform. Speaking of Microsoft and Windows, if you are a *nix bash type person yet need (or have) to work with Windows, bash (and more) are coming to Windows 10. Ubuntu desktop GUI or User Interface options include Unity along with tools such as Compiz and LibreOffice (an alternative to Microsoft Office).

What’s New In the Bits and Bytes (e.g. Software)

Ubuntu 16.04 LTS is based on the Linux 4.4 kernel, that also includes Python 3, Ceph Jewel (block, file and object storage) and OpenStack Mitaka among other enhancements. These and other fixes as well as enhancements include:

  • Libvirt 1.3.1
  • Qemu 2.5
  • Open vSwitch 2.5.0
  • NginxLX2 2.0
  • Docker 1.10
  • PHP 7.9
  • MySQL 7.0
  • Juju 2.0
  • Golang 1.6 toolchain
  • OpenSSH 7.2p2 with legacy support along with cipher improvements, including 1024 bit diffie-hellman-group1-sha1 key exchange, ssh-dss, ssh-dss-cert
  • GNU toolchain
  • Apt 1.2

What About Ubuntu for IBM zSeries Mainframe

Ubuntu runs on 64 bit zSeries architecture with about 95% binary compatibility. If you look at the release notes, there are still a few things being worked out among known issues. However (read the release notes), Ubuntu 16.04 LTS has OpenStack and Ceph, means that those capabilities could be deployed on a zSeries.

Now some of you might think wait, how can Linux and Ceph among others work on a FICON based mainframe?

No worries, keep in mind that FICON the IBM zSeries server storage I/O protocol that co-exists on Fibre Channel along with SCSI_FCP (e.g. FCP) aka what most Open Systems people simply refer to as Fibre Channel (FC) works with the zOS and other operating systems. In the case of native Linux on zSeries, those systems can in fact use SCSI mode for accessing shared storage. In addition to the IBM LinuxOne site, you can learn more about Ubuntu running native on zSeries here on the Ubuntu site.

Where To Learn More

What This All Means

Ubuntu as a Linux distribution continues to evolve and increase in deployment across different environments. Some still view Ubuntu as the low-end Linux for home, hobbyist or those looking for a alternative desktop to Microsoft Windows among others. However Ubuntu is also increasingly being used in roles where other Linux distribution such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL), SUSE and Centos among others have gained prior popularity.

In someway’s you can view RHEL as the first generation Linux distribution that gained popular in the enterprise with early adopters, followed by a second wave or generation of those who favored Centos among others such as the cloud crowd. Then there is the Ubuntu wave which is expanding in many areas along with others such as CoreOS. Granted with some people the preference between one Linux distribution vs. another can be as polarizing as Linux vs. Windows, OpenSystems vs. Mainframe vs. Cloud among others.

Having various Ubuntu distributions installed across different servers (in addition to Centos, Suse and others), I found the install and new capabilities of Ubuntu 16.04 LTS interesting and continue to explore the many new features, while upgrading some of my older systems.

Get the Ubuntu 16.04 LTS bits here to give a try or upgrade your existing systems.

Ok, nuff said

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Cloud Constellation SpaceBelt – Out Of This World Cloud Data Centers?

Cloud Constellation SpaceBelt – Out Of This World Cloud Data Centers?

server storage I/O trends

A new startup called Cloud Constellation (aka SpaceBelt) has announced and proposes converge space terrestrial satellite technology with IT information and cloud related data infrastructure technologies including NVM (e.g. SSD) and storage class memory (SCM). While announcing their Series A funding and proposed value proposition (below), Cloud Constellation did not say how much funding, who the investors are, or management team leading to some, well, rather cloud information.

Cloud Constellation’s SpaceBelt transforms cybersecurity for enterprise and government operations moving high-value data around the world by:

  • insulating it completely from the Internet and terrestrial leased lines
  • liberating it from cyberattacks and surreptitious activities
  • protecting it from natural disasters and force majeure events
  • addressing all jurisdictional complexities and constraints
  • avoiding risks of violating privacy regulations

Truly secure data transfer: Enterprises and governments will finally be enabled to bypass use of leaky networks and compromised servers interconnecting their sites around the world.

New option for cloud service providers: The service will be a key market differentiator for cloud service providers to offer a transformative, ultra-high degree of network security to clients reliant on moving sensitive, mission-critical data around the world each day.

What is SpaceBelt Cloud Constellation?

From their website www.cloudconstellation.com you will see following.

Cloud Constellation Space Belt
www.cloudconstellation.com

Keeping in mind that today is April 1st which means April Fools day 2016, my motto for the day is trust yet verify. So just for fun, check out this new company that I had a briefing with earlier this week that also announced their Series A funding earlier in March 2016.

The question you have to ask yourself today is if this is an out of this world April Fools prank, an out of this world idea that will eclipse current cloud services such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google, IBM Softlayer, Microsoft Azure, Rackspace among others?

Or, will SpaceBelt go the way of earlier cloud high flyers HP Cloud, Nirvanix among others.

Btw, keep in mind that only you can prevent cloud data loss, however cloud and virtual data availability is also a shared responsibility.

Some Questions and Things To Ponder

  • Is this an April Fools Joke?
  • How much Non Volatile Memory (NVM) such as NAND, 3D Nand, 3D XPoint or other Storage Class Memory (SCM) can be physically placed on each bird (e.g. Satellite)
  • What will the solar panels look like to power the birds, plus battery’s for heating and cooling the NVM (contrary to popular myth, NVMs do get warm if not hot)
  • What is the availability, accessibility and durability model, how will data be replicated, mirrored or an out of this world LRC/Erasure Code Advanced Parity model be used?
  • How will the storage be accessed, what will the end-points look like, iSCSI, NDB, FUSE, NFS, CIFS, HDFS, Torrent, JSON, ODBC, REST/HTTP, FTP or something else?
  • Security will be a concern as well as geo placement, after all, its one thing to move data across some borders, how about if the data is hundreds of miles above those borders?
  • Cost will be an interesting model to follow, as well as competitors from SpaceX, Amazon, Boeing, GE, NSA, Google, Facebook or others emerge?
  • What will the uplink and download speeds be, not to mention latency of moving and accessing data from the satellites. For those who have DirectTV or other terrestrial service you know the pros and cons associated with that. Speaking of which, perhaps you have experienced a thunder-storm with DirecTV or Dish, or perhaps a cloud storm due to a cloud provider service or site failure, think about what happens to your cloud data if the satellite dish is disrupted during an upload or download.
  • I also wonder how the various industry trade groups will wrap their head around this one, what kind of new standards, initiatives and out of this world marketing promotions will we see or hear about? You know that some creative marketer will declare surface clouds as dead, just saying.

Where To Learn More

What This All Means

The folks over at cloud constellation say their space belt made up of a constellation (e.g. in orbit cluster) of satellites will be circling the globe around 2019. I wonder if they will be ready to do a proof of concept (poc) technology demonstrator of their IP using TCP based networking, server, storage I/O protocols leveraging a hot air balloon or weather balloon near term, if not, would be a great marketing ploy.

If nothing else, putting their data infrastructure technology on a hot air balloon could be a fun marketing ploy to say their cloud rises above the hot air of other cloud marketing. Or if they do a POC using a weather balloon, they could show and say their cloud rises above traditional cloud storms, oh the fun…

Check out Cloud Constellation and their Spacebelt, see for yourself and then you decide what is going on!

Remember, its April Fools day today, trust, yet verify.

What say you, is this an April Fools Joke or the next big thing?

Ok, nuff said (for now), time to listen to Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon ;)

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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The Future of Ethernet – 2016 Roadmap released by Ethernet Alliance

The Future of Ethernet – 2016 Roadmap released by Ethernet Alliance

server storage I/O trends

The Future of Ethernet – 2016 Roadmap released by Ethernet Alliance

Ethernet Alliance Roadmap

The Ethernet Alliance has announced their 2016 roadmap of enhancements for Ethernet.

Ethernet enhancements include speeds, connectivity interfaces that span needs from consumer, enterprise, to cloud and managed service providers.

Highlights of Ethernet Roadmap

  • FlexEthernet (FlexE)
  • QSFP-DD, microQSFP and OBO interfaces
  • Speeds from 10Mbps to 400GbE.
  • 4 Pair Power over Ethernet (PoE)
  • Power over Data Line (PoDL)

Ethernet Alliance 2016 Roadmap Image
Images via EthernetAlliance.org

Who is the Ethernet Alliance

The Ethernet Alliance (@ethernetallianc) is an industry trade and marketing consortium focused on the advancement and success of Ethernet related technologies.

Where to learn more

The Ethernet Alliance has also made available via their web site two presentations part one here and part two here (or click on the following images).

Ethernet Alliance 2016 roadmap presentation #1 Ethernet Alliance 2016 roadmap presentation #2

Also visit www.ethernetalliance.org/roadmap

What this all means

Ethernet technologies continue to be enhanced from consumer focused, Internet of Things (IoT) and Internet of Devices (IoD) to enterprise, data centers, IT and non-IT usage as well as cloud and managed service providers. At the lower end where there is broad adoption, the continued evolution of easier to use, lower cost, interoperable technologies and interfaces expands Ethernet adoption footprint while at the higher-end, all of those IoT, IoD, consumer and other devices aggregated (consolidate) into cloud and other services that have the need for speeds from 10GbE, 40GbE, 100GbE and 400GbE.

With the 2016 Roadmap the Ethernet Alliance has provided good direction as to where Ethernet fits today and tomorrow.

Ok, nuff said (for now)

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Dude, Dell is Getting (Buying) an EMC and VMware Deal

Storage I/O trends

Dude, Dell is Getting (Buying) an EMC and VMware Deal

Some of you might remember the marketing campaign "Dude you’re getting a Dell" to show somebody buying a Dell computer.

Today, Dell as in Michael Dell and his corporation Dell along with partner Silver Lake investment announced a $67B USD deal that they are acquiring EMC along with their stake in VMware which will stay an independently public traded company. Dell brings strength in small and medium-mid market strength and supplier to cloud and other managed service providers, Dell financing combines with EMC strength and enterprise portfolio. This deal also reunites the two parties who before had a strong storage joint venture with Dell OEMing EMC storage for about a decade before going their separate ways in the late 2000s.

Dell buying EMC

Key points

  • Privately held Dell is acquiring EMC and its various business units
  • VMware will stay independent public company with Dell as major owner
  • EMC based in Hopkinton Massachusetts will be headquarters for new Dell Systems Business Unit
  • Dell Systems Business Unit will also be headquarters for Dell servers
  • New Dell Systems Business Unit joint with EMC is expected to be a $30B USD plus sized entity
  • Dell see’s revenue synergies of about 3x over 1x cost of the combined entities
  • Dell see’s ability to generate cash to service debt coming from increased revenue growth
  • EMC global support, professional services, consulting to complement Dell capabilities
  • Ability for both partners to leverage their best of strengths from SMB to enterprise to cloud

What this means big picture

Basically EMC has gone private under the Dell umbrella while VMware remains an independent publicly traded company, granted with EMC and now Dell being the primary shareholder of that entity. Dell went private back in 2013 with its founder Michael Dell along with Silver Lake Partners as key investors. EMC has been under pressure from activist investors to sell off its investment in VMware to increase shareholder and was rumored to have been in acquisition discussions with other organizations such as HP. Now EMC (e.g. the non-VMware part) is effectively a private held company as the Dell Systems Business Unit to be initially headquartered in Hopkinton Massachusetts (EMC Headquarters) while Dell Corporation headquarters will remain in Austin Texas.

The server business will be based in Hopkinton, which will be targeted at around a $30B USD business. Ironic that Massachusetts used to be a focus for server vendors from Dell (acquired by Compaq and then HP), Wang, DG (acquired by EMC) among others. This transaction puts Massachusetts back on the map as the Dell System Business Unit will also now be home to Dell servers. As of the announcement, there is an expectation that the Hopkinton headquarters will grow vs. shrink. Granted., some consolidation can be expected.

Some questions that exist (among many others)

What about Pivotal?

One of the questions I have is that during the announcement discussions, not much if anything has been said about Pivotal and its future role or how it will be folded in, or set up as a tracking stock or similar activity. Also something to keep in mind as food for thought, or speculation, is that GE is an investor in Pivotal and GE has made noise about becoming more prominent player in software, just saying. In the meantime, let’s wait and see what happens with Pivotal.

What about Lenovo relationship?

After the last Dell breakup, EMC established a partnership and initiative with Lenovo to jointly produce servers that had been being sourced from Dell or others, as well as EMC moving its Iomega SMB storage business into the Lenovo initiative. Note that about a year ago Lenovo bought the former IBM x86 server business. What will become of that partnership for servers, as well as for Iomega moving forward?

How will product rationalization occur?

There is some product overlap in the storage business, as well as backup/data protection among some other areas. However looking at the bigger picture, there is not much if any overlap. Where there is overlap, one near-term approach that might (this is speculation) occur is to segment potential competing products into Enterprise and Systems business vs. SMB or entry-level. This could occur for storage products such as Dell Compellent, Exanet based Fluid NAS, EqualLogic and MD (OEM from NetApp) vs. those from EMC such as VMAX, VNX, Isilon, XtremIO, Datadomain among others. Likewise, there will need to be some rationalization for backup and data protection products such as EMC Networker, Avamar vs. Dell AppAssure, vRanger, NetVault as well as their OEM partners Commvault and Symantec among others.

VCE gets leveraged as part of go to market?

EMC took over ownership of VCE in 2014 with Cisco still involved, in fact if a product has Vblock in its name, it will be a Cisco server and network. However look for other VCE solutions to appear as well as the VxRACK announced earlier this year. I would expect new converge infrastructure (CI), hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) and Cluster-in-Box (CiB) solutions from VCE that would include Dell servers in the future leveraging different software (VMware among others).

How will Dell OEM business drive things?

Dell has had a server OEM business that has supplied technology to others, including in the past EMC. This business moves in under the new System Business Unit as part of what is or was EMC. Beyond servers, it will be interesting to see how that business unit can also move other technologies into the OEM or high volume market including to cloud and managed service providers who buy in bulk.

Will this cause Cisco an EMC partner to buy another storage vendor?

Maybe, that depends on what Cisco wants to do moving forward in addition to remaining a partner with EMC. Of course, if Cisco were to go storage shopping, who would that be? Perhaps DDN, Nimble or NetApp?

With Michael Dell now having done one of, if not the largest tech deals in history, how will Larry Ellison of Oracle react?

It has been said that the difference between God and Larry Ellison is that God was not interested in becoming Larry Ellison, however, is Larry Ellison still interested in industry bragging rights meaning will he want to do a big block buster deal involving Oracle to get some headlines, or enjoy his semi-retirement, perhaps buying a bankrupt country or something?

Where to read, watch and learn more

Storage I/O trends

What this all means and wrap up

Certainly there are many more questions about server, storage, I/O networking, cloud, virtual, software, hardware, security and management tools along with service and support that will get addressed in follow-up discussions.

Near term, the combined entity needs to get out front and sell to customers, partners and prospects that EMC is not going away, or that Dell is going to get in the way of existing business. The two need to run as is pursuing and closing each others respective business making sure that competitors do not create barriers to deals closing and disrupting revenue. In other words, neither Dell nor EMC can afford to foster a revenue prevention department now, nor can either afford to allow any other competitor to become a revenue prevention department as a service (e.g. costing either EMC or Dell revenue).

Overall this deal has some interesting upside synergies and potential, granted, we will need to see how things unfold.

Disclosure: Dell and EMC have been Server StorageIO clients, and StorageIO uses Dell as well as Lenovo servers among others technologies including VMware.

Ok, nuff said, for now…

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2023 Server StorageIO(R) and UnlimitedIO All Rights Reserved

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Supermicro CSE-M14TQC Use your media bay to add 12 Gbps SAS SSD drives to your server

Storage I/O trends

Supermicro CSE-M14TQC Use your media bay to add 12 Gbps SAS SSD drives to your server

Do you have a computer server, workstation or mini-tower PC that needs to have more 2.5" form factor hard disk drive (HDD), solid state device (SSD) or hybrid flash drives added yet no expansion space?

Do you also want or need the HDD or SSD drive expansion slots to be hot swappable, 6 Gbps SATA3 along with up to 12 Gbps SAS devices?

Do you have an available 5.25" media bay slot (e.g. where you can add an optional CD or DVD drive) or can you remove your existing CD or DVD drive using USB for software loading?

Do you need to carry out the above without swapping out your existing server or workstation on a reasonable budget, say around $100 USD plus tax, handling, shipping (your prices may vary)?

If you need implement the above, then here is a possible solution, or in my case, an real solution.

Via StorageIOblog Supermicro 4 x 2.5 12Gbps SAS enclosure CSE-M14TQC
Supermicro CSE-M14TQC with hot swap canister before installing in one of my servers

In the past I have used a solution from Startech that supports up to 4 x 2.5" 6 Gbps SAS and SATA drives in a 5.25" media bay form factor installing these in my various HP, Dell and Lenovo servers to increase internal storage bays (slots).

Via Amazon.com StarTech SAS and SATA expansion
Via Amazon.com StarTech 4 x 2.5" SAS and SATA internal enclosure

I still use the StarTech device shown (read earlier reviews and experiences here, here and here) above in some of my servers which continue to be great for 6Gbps SAS and SATA 2.5" HDDs and SSDs. However for 12 Gbps SAS devices, I have used other approaches including external 12 Gbps SAS enclosures.

Recently while talking with the folks over at Servers Direct, I mentioned how I was using StarTech 4 x 2.5" 6Gbps SAS/SATA media bay enclosure as a means of boosting the number of internal drives that could be put into some smaller servers. The Servers Direct folks told me about the Supermicro CSE-M14TQC which after doing some research, I decided to buy one to complement the StarTech 6Gbps enclosures, as well as external 12 Gbps SAS enclosures or other internal options.

What is the Supermicro CSE-M14TQC?

The CSE-M14TQC is a 5.25" form factor enclosure that enables four (4) 2.5" hot swappable (if your adapter and OS supports hot swap) 12 Gbps SAS or 6 Gbps SATA devices (HDD and SSD) to fit into the media bay slot normally used by CD/DVD devices in servers or workstations. There is a single Molex male power connector on the rear of the enclosure that can be used to attach to your servers available power using applicable connector adapters. In addition there are four seperate drive connectors (e.g. SATA type connectors) that support up to 12 Gbps SAS per drive which you can attach to your servers motherboard (note SAS devices need a SAS controller), HBA or RAID adapters internal ports.

Cooling is provided via a rear mounted 12,500 RPM 16 cubic feet per minute fan, each of the four drives are hot swappable (requires operating system or hypervisor support) contained in a small canister (provided with the enclosure). Drives easily mount to the canister via screws that are also supplied as part of the enclosure kit. There is also a drive activity and failure notification LED for the devices. If you do not have any available SAS or SATA ports on your servers motherboard, you can use an available PCIe slot and add a HBA or RAID card for attaching the CSE-M14TQC to the drives. For example, a 12 Gbps SAS (6 Gbps SATA) Avago/LSI RAID card, or a 6 Gbps SAS/SATA RAID card.

Via Supermicro CSE-M14TQC rear details (4 x SATA and 1 Molex power connector)

Via StorageIOblog Supermicro 4 x 2.5 rear view CSE-M14TQC 12Gbps SAS enclosure
CSE-M14TQCrear view before installation

Via StorageIOblog Supermicro CSE-M14TQC 12Gbps SAS enclosure cabling
CSE-M14TQC ready for installation with 4 x SATA (12 Gbps SAS) drive connectors and Molex power connector

Tip: In the case of the Lenovo TS140 that I initially installed the CSE-M14TQC into, there is not a lot of space for installing the drive connectors or Molex power connector to the enclosure. Instead, attach the cables to the CSE-M14TQC as shown above before installing the enclosure into the media bay slot. Simply attach the connectors as shown and feed them through the media bay opening as you install the CSE-M14TQC enclosure. Then attach the drive connectors to your HBA, RAID card or server motherboard and the power connector to your power source inside the server.

Note and disclaimer, pay attention to your server manufactures power loading and specification along with how much power will be used by the HDD or SSD’s to be installed to avoid electrical power or fire issues due to overloading!

Via StorageIOblog Supermicro CSE-M14TQC enclosure Lenovo TS140
CSE-M14TQC installed into Lenovo TS140 empty media bay

Via StorageIOblog Supermicro CSE-M14TQC drive enclosure Lenovo TS140

CSE-M14TQC installed with front face plated installed on Lenovo TS140

Where to read, watch and learn more

Storage I/O trends

What this all means and wrap up

If you have a server that simply needs some extra storage capacity by adding some 2.5" HDDs, or boosting performance with fast SSDs yet do not have any more internal drive slots or expansion bays, leverage your media bay. This applies to smaller environments where you might have one or two servers, as well as for environments where you want or need to create a scale out software defined storage or hyper-converged platform using your own hardware. Another option is that if you have a lab or test environment for VMware vSphere ESXi Windows, Linux, Openstack or other things, this can be a cost-effective approach to adding both storage space capacity as well as performance and leveraging newer 12Gbps SAS technologies.

For example, create a VMware VSAN cluster using smaller servers such as Lenovo TS140 or equivalent where you can install a couple of 6TB or 8TB higher capacity 3.5" drive in the internal drive bays, then adding a couple of 12 Gbps SAS SSDs along with a couple of 2.5" 2TB (or larger) HDDs along with a RAID card, and high-speed networking card. If VMware VSAN is not your thing, how about setting up a Windows Server 2012 R2 failover cluster including Scale Out File Server (SOFS) with Hyper-V, or perhaps OpenStack or one of many other virtual storage appliances (VSA) or software defined storage, networking or other solutions. Perhaps you need to deploy more storage for a big data Hadoop based analytics system, or cloud or object storage solution? On the other hand, if you simply need to add some storage to your storage or media or gaming server or general purpose server, the CSE-M14TQC can be an option along with other external solutions.

Ok, nuff said

Cheers
Gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC All Rights Reserved

Posted on

Data Protection Gumbo = Protect Preserve and Serve Information

Storage I/O trends

Data Protection Gumbo = Protect Preserve and Serve Information

Recently I was invited to be a guest on the podcast Data Protection Gumbo hosted by Demetrius Malbrough (@dmalbrough).

Data Protection Gumbo Podcast Description
Data Protection Gumbo is set up with the aim of expanding the awareness of anyone responsible for protecting mission critical data, by providing them with a mix of the latest news, data protection technologies, and interesting facts on topics in the Data Backup and Recovery industry.

Data Protection Gumbo Also available on

Protect Preserve and Serve Applications, Information and Data

Keep in mind that a fundamental role of Information Technology (IT) is to protect, preserve and serve business or organizations information assets including applications, configuration settings and data for use when or where needed.

Our conversation covers various aspects of data protection which has a focus of protect preserve and serve information, applications and data across different environments and customer segments. While we discuss enterprise and small medium business (SMB) data protection, we also talk about trends from Mobile to the cloud among many others tools, technologies and techniques.

Where to learn more

Learn more about data protection and related trends, tools and technologies via the following links:

Data Protection Gumbo Also available on

What this all means and wrap-up

Data protection is a broad topic that spans from logical and physical security to high availability (HA), disaster recovery (DR), business continuance (BC), business resiliency (BR), archiving (including life beyond compliance) along with various tools, technologies, techniques. Keeping with the theme of protect preserve and serve, data protection to be modernized needs to become and be seen as a business asset or enabler vs. an after thought or cost over-head topic. Also, keep in mind that only you can prevent data loss, are your restores ready for when you need them?

Check out Demetrius Data Protection Gumbo podcast, also check out his Linkedin Backup & Recovery Professionals group. Speaking of data protection, check out the www.storageioblog.com/data-protection-diaries-main/ page for more coverage of backup/restore, HA, BC, DR, archiving and restated themes.

Ok, nuff said, for now..

Cheers gs

Greg Schulz – Author Cloud and Virtual Data Storage Networking (CRC Press), The Green and Virtual Data Center (CRC Press) and Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier)
twitter @storageio

All Comments, (C) and (TM) belong to their owners/posters, Other content (C) Copyright 2006-2024 Server StorageIO and UnlimitedIO LLC All Rights Reserved