SAN Storage options

[RabbieBurns]

Looking at 3 possible contenders for a replacement SAN.

 

Im considering Dell Compellent, Hitatchi HUS110, or the IBM v7000

 

All seem pretty similar.

 

Has anyone had experience with them that could comment pros and cons?

[Rodan]

Hi,

 

I've worked with some Dell Compellents and they're my favourite array right now, and I've used a few

 

Pros: Great management interface and reporting, the tiering works very efficiently, expansion can be as little or much as you want (unlike VNX), so far very relieable, new features regularly released, array migration is free and easy.

Cons: The cost but as the protocol states "Good, Fast, Cheap: Pick any two (you can't have all three).", getting the new software can be a bit time consuming, Enterprise manager is OK but not great at scheduled reporting.

 

I've not used Hitatchi and I've only used IBM with a DS4XXX series array which was very disappointing, hopefully thety've improved.

 

Happy to answer anything else about the Compellent or EMC (and Oracle (Sun) arrays if you're looking at those)

[glennda]

Got a client who is looking at the V7000 at the moment but they are going XIV.

 

Personally I would at Nimble Storage - I'm fairly sure they have a contingent down in Oz.

 

All depends on what you want to run on the storage and its IOP requirements.

[SYNACK]

Just waiting on my second IBM SAN, its smaller around the DS3500 size connected by SAS and apart from the IBM software being insane in size (like 4GB for a simple config and monitoring tool) the original unit has been good after a few initial hickups. The secondary controller would not update and required a new flash module.

 

The next one is replacing an old HP MSA 2012i which is now slow in comparison.

 

Went with ibm as we can actually get that here in NZ, it was the most cost effective - cutting 1/3 off the hp price - and had a lot of the extras like easy-tier (ssd cache) for free. The new one, when IBM ships all of it should have a couple od SSDs then the rest fully populated with near line SAS for massive storage capacity with rather decent speed.

 

IBM's support can be a massive PiA though as you need to navigate through their usually half broken site to find the appropriate filing cabinet in the appropriate basement to file your support request in but they do get back to you and seemingly have people who actually know a bit about the products.

 

Have not dealt with the others but thought anecdotal input was better than none at all.

Edited June 4, 2014 by SYNACK

[Oaktech]

EMC all the way... We've bought 27tb of VNX5100 and it was set up and working in a day. We chose it over the Dell and Netapp options as the scalability was better than the Dell and the IOPS performance was better than both of them.

[Davit2005]

Nimble didn't support Fibre Channel and only supported iSCSI when we looked about a month ago, I'd also consider EMC as a strong contender.

[glennda]

Nimble didn't support Fibre Channel and only supported iSCSI when we looked about a month ago, I'd also consider EMC as a strong contender.

 

That is correct - but these days with 10GB ISCSI it doesn't really make too much difference, not much supports 16GB FC anyway

[Rodan]

That is correct - but these days with 10GB ISCSI it doesn't really make too much difference, not much supports 16GB FC anyway

 

Agreed, however if you've invested in FC skills and infrastructure, you'd want to avoid purchasing again.

 

One of the things that counted againt the VNX for us is that for expansion you need to buy sufficient disks that match the underlying RAID that makes up the storage pools. Compellent and probably others you can add as few or many as you desire due to the nifty way it handles data writes and progression.

[Oaktech]

Agreed, however if you've invested in FC skills and infrastructure, you'd want to avoid purchasing again.

 

One of the things that counted againt the VNX for us is that for expansion you need to buy sufficient disks that match the underlying RAID that makes up the storage pools. Compellent and probably others you can add as few or many as you desire due to the nifty way it handles data writes and progression.

 

 

I'm pretty sure that is not true any more, as long as the disk type matches, you can add what you like as far as numbers go, or you can create and assign new LUN's in whatever arrangement of capacity, raid config and access arrangements you choose...

 

I've got an EMC engineer on site right now completing an install , I'll check!

[robjduk]

I love my Dell stuff as the support I have received is just amazing however I have had quotes for the Hitachi stuff in the past and although it comes out more expensive I have been impressed with the promises it makes like apparently the SANS can email faults to its base so the engineer turns up with no involvement from you. Cant say it works that well in real life but that's what the people who tried to sell it to me claimed.

[glennda]

I love my Dell stuff as the support I have received is just amazing however I have had quotes for the Hitachi stuff in the past and although it comes out more expensive I have been impressed with the promises it makes like apparently the SANS can email faults to its base so the engineer turns up with no involvement from you. Cant say it works that well in real life but that's what the people who tried to sell it to me claimed.

 

Yeah the Nimble's do that, they have autosupport which means the devices sends them data every 5 minutes and it is automatically processed and any faults or problems raised.

 

They also have InfoSight which is brilliant for capacity planning.