You can buy two PS4000 EQ's for 30k. Dell was selling a complete virtualization package last week with two 810 servers, PS4000 SAN, Two Powerconnect 5424 switches, and your choice of vSphere 4 or Windows 2008R2 with Hyper-V for 26k.
-----Original Message----- From: John Aldrich [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 9:58 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: SAN question To answer your questions in order: 1) Failover capability would be very good to have. I need a minimum of two controllers so that if one fails, at least we can run on the other until we fix the first. That could also be handled by a dual-controller "head" unit. So that brings single-node with dumb drive trays back equal with "smart" trays. 2) Scalability -- I firmly believe that your data WILL eventually grow to match available disk space, so I'd like the ability to add space easily. That being said, either method will work to add space. So far, my *MINIMUM* requirements are as follows: 1) No single point of failure (Redundant power, redundant controllers, RAID, redundant Ethernet, etc.) 2) Approximately 5 Tb of useable disk space (that should give us a little breathing room once we start redirecting critical folders from users' desktop machines and add in email) 3) RAID 5 minimum to help prevent loss of data from drive failures. 4) Under $30K 5) Any replication needs to be done on the SAN and not involve software (such as Backup Exec) on a server. Anything more than that is gravy. From: Jonathan Link [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, September 23, 2010 10:33 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: SAN question I think we have given you the benefit of our knowledge. Several times even. What requirement do you have that would be met by additional controllers? Failover capability? Scalability? Again, for like the third time, what are your requirements, that'll drive your analysis. On Thu, Sep 23, 2010 at 10:16 AM, John Aldrich <[email protected]> wrote: Ok, guys. I'm trying to narrow down my many choices with regards to our on-going search for a SAN manufacturer. I'd like your thoughts on the whole question of adding more intelligence vs just adding more disks. i.e. the EQ vs LeftHand models. I can see arguments to be made for both models. I'll tell you that, initially, the SAN is going to be a glorified file server, however, we plan on hosting our email data store on the SAN when we bring email in-house later on. I've already verified with the email vendor that I hope to use that this is not a problem, so that's a non-issue. Other than that, the only database we would store on the SAN would possibly be the database from our Vipre install, although initially that would stay on the local storage. So, I'd like to see some discussions of the benefits of just adding a tray of "dumb drives" or adding a complete controller along with the drives (a la LeftHand.) I just don't know enough about the benefits of each model to know what would work best for us. I'm hoping that you guys who are more experienced would give me the benefit of your knowledge. Thanks, John Aldrich IT Manager, Blueridge Carpet 706-276-2001, Ext. 2233 ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
