Have you looked the versions of these Dell re-sells?
Can be significantly cheaper, IME. -sc From: John Aldrich [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 10:04 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions I have looked at Equallogic and EMC. I really can't afford EMC. I found an Equallogic VAR through one of our fellow list members and they have given me an unofficial quote due to the project having previously been registered with another local VAR. I've advised the local VAR that I can't afford them and that I want to switch VARs and would they release the project? Thus far, even with help from my Dell account rep, I haven't been able to get the project switched, but we're working on it. The national VAR's quote is just squeaking by under the wire, if they can trim things just a hair, as with labor, it's just over the hard cap I have. I'm definitely interested in Equallogic, although it worries me that if I want to expand the SAN, I have to buy the whole thing over again, I can't just add a tray of drives. I understand the advantages, but it does bother me a bit. From: Steven M. Caesare [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 9:37 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions Indeed. My own $0.02: an HDS solution may not be the best bang-for the buck. Check out Dell's EMC or EqualLogic stuff? -sc From: John Aldrich [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 9:30 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions No, pretty much just simple file sharing. I'm wanting to migrate everyone's "critical" files off their PC onto the network and eventually bring email in-house and put the mail store on the SAN. Definitely want to make sure this supports more than one iSCSI initiator, in that case, I guess. J From: Steven M. Caesare [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 9:20 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions As long as you aren't requiring something that needs shared storage (VMware Live motion, Windows clustering, etc...) then you can certainly do that, it will just obviously require manual intervention. Definitely dedicated NICs, preferably that support TOE/jumbo frames. -sc From: John Aldrich [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 9:07 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions Ahh... Well, I'm not sure how well that'd work out, although if I can have the second server set up to connect if the primary server goes down, that shouldn't be a problem, but I'd prefer to have both primary and backup server connected at all times, "just in case." J I'll definitely keep that in mind. Any other things I should look out for? Would you guys recommend having a dedicated "iSCSI Adapter" (dedicated NIC) for the iSCSI connection or do you think sharing the traffic on the existing NIC would be sufficient? I have a second connection available on the existing NIC (dual-port NIC) on each server, so I guess I could use that. Currently our servers are just loafing, so I think I've got enough horsepower to act as the "gateway" device for the SAN, just a question of if the network can handle the load. J I think, since I have extra fiber pairs available, I'll probably run a dedicated channel for the primary SAN here at the main plant and figure something out for the SAN at the D/R site later. From: Steven M. Caesare [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 8:58 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions A single iSCSI initiator would limit you to one server connected via iSCSI at a time. -sc From: John Aldrich [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, January 19, 2010 8:31 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN solutions Ok, I'll admit to being extremely "green" when it comes to this sort of thing (and I don't mean "green" in the energy efficient sense either J) Can you explain what you mean when you say it can only support one iSCSI initiator at a time? Does that mean that if I connect the SAN to the server and share the files out over that server, that only one person at a time can access the data? From: Jonathan Link [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, January 18, 2010 6:32 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: SAN solutions Be careful, a lot of SMB SAN's support only one iscsi initiator at a time. On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 5:01 PM, John Aldrich < [email protected]> wrote: Well, according to the sales guy, a few years ago Hitachi decided they wanted to start making SANS for the SMB market and started producing SANs with no frills... pretty bare bones storage, but with replication on-board. J Although he didn't *say* it is sounds like there are certain pre-configured packages that they offer and that's it. In case anyone's curious they are called Hitachi Simple Modular Storage 100. I'm looking at 6 Terabytes in a RAID 6 configuration with dual controllers and on-board replication (still to be determined if it replicates *everything* or just the changes!) and installation, and 3 year nbd warranty for just over $21,000. From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, January 18, 2010 4:18 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: SAN solutions +1 ASB Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry ________________________________ From: Kevin Lundy <[email protected]> Date: Mon, 18 Jan 2010 16:01:44 -0500 To: NT System Admin Issues<[email protected]> Subject: Re: SAN solutions Assuming these are HDS - you need to make sure and also get all the management tools priced. That is one thing I discovered with HDS a couple of years ago - they don't include anything from a s/w perspective. And at the price below, I'm not sure it is HDS. Unless they have come out with an entry level line of products, I don't think you can get what you describe for any where near 20k. On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 3:56 PM, John Aldrich < [email protected]> wrote: Ahh... Got a sales guy who used to work for CDW who thinks he can hook me up with two dual-controller SANs, including on-board replication for a hair over $20K. That's for about 6 Terabytes. I'll ask for more info in that case. J From: Kevin Lundy [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Monday, January 18, 2010 3:53 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: SAN solutions Hitachi (HDS) makes some awesome SANs. One of the tier 1 providers. Tier 1 price as well. On Mon, Jan 18, 2010 at 3:45 PM, John Aldrich < [email protected]> wrote: Just wondering if any of you have heard of NexSan? What about Hitachi?? Any thoughts on either of these as a SAN vendor? I'm still trying to find someone who'll really "wow" me with their product and give me what I need for a price I can afford and get Management to sign off on. J ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~
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