New SAN recommendations

[badders]

We are looking at increasing our available storage, currently we have an HP MSA2012 fc with 3.6Tb (raid10) of usable space. This runs all our virtual servers (vmware) and is now becoming rapidly too small. Does any one have any recommendations for an additional SAN, we would like it to have dual fibre controllers and a minimum of 7.2Tb usable storage when using RAID10.

 

Thanks.

[Paid_Peanuts]

I have used an IBM DS3400 for almost 5 years and it has been rock solid.

The latest iteration is their DS3512. You can spec it to include dual fibre controllers and with enough expansion to meet your needs.

 

I can highly recommend the IBM equipment!

[DMcCoy]

Have you thought about RAID6 instead? I found performance still good with a 2012i, it's certainly worth testing, RAID10 just seems such a waste of drives.

[RTFM]

We have 2x NetApp 2040's and they are awesome pieces of kit. Highly recommend them

[nicholab]

You get a lot with Dot Hill | Simple.Smart.Storage

[cpjitservices]

We use these.....

 

Nimbus Data: Leader in Sustainable Storage®

 

it's all flash storage - no moving parts!

[bandgeekmafia78]

The Dell Equallogic SANs are really good but they are expensive.

[RTFM]

Just remembered, we had a pretty good demo of the EMC SAN, we plumped for NetApp in the end but potentially worth a look

[ict_support]

+1 for Netapp. They are the daddy in terms of virtualisation, VMware often demo on them even though they own EMC or the other way round

The duplication is fantastic and the background snapshot technology is awesome. I use them across two large secondary schools and Snapshot every hour. They have a licensed from Microsoft for CIF so it just works using the previous versions tab. Example a Student creates a piece of work at 9 and accidently deletes it at 11 we can restore the work from 9 and go back 13 weeks using the same method. Netapps snap mirror is great too, setup an identical Netapp in another Part of the building and replicate on the fly.

 

The main issue with the Netapp is that if its setup correctly you forget how to use it as you hardly ever need to touch it. Setup and forget!!

You also need to haggle hard,but they will come down in price especially if competing with EMC!

The EMC are great pieces of kit too but the NETapp is the Daddy of storage. HP /Dell they are just playing at SANS.

You need to look at 2040’s and above some people will try to sell you a 2020 but they don’t have enough nic’s

Edited December 18, 2012 by ict_support

[CyberNerd]

I have used an IBM DS3400 for almost 5 years and it has been rock solid.

The latest iteration is their DS3512. You can spec it to include dual fibre controllers and with enough expansion to meet your needs.

 

I can highly recommend the IBM equipment!

 

We have the same, also for about 5 yrs and it has been great. We'll likely upgrade to DS3512 next year.

[john]

Are you not fancying adding the extra drive bay enclosure to take it from 12 disks to 24 disk ?

 

Additional capacity can easily be added when needed by attaching up to three MSA2000 12 bay drive enclosures. Maximum raw capacity ranges from 5.4TB SAS or 12TB SATA in the base cabinet, to over 21.6TB SAS or 48TB SATA with the addition of the maximum number of drive enclosures. NOTE: there are no additional hidden charges, licenses or fees as you add enclosures or hosts and users.

 

That would be the cheapest way of adding more storage if you are happy with the SAN as a product still.

[badders]

Thanks to everyone who's recommended various options, it's certainly given us plenty of options. We never thought about adding an extra enclosure to the existing san.

[glennda]

Open-E - Doesn't use controllers as such as you install it onto hardware but will get you on the most bang for your buck and in terms of scale ability its brilliant.

[Domino]

Are you not fancying adding the extra drive bay enclosure to take it from 12 disks to 24 disk ?

 

 

 

That would be the cheapest way of adding more storage if you are happy with the SAN as a product still.

 

If you're worried about perfomance though you can also upgrade the controllers in the chassis to the 2312FC models - they've much beefier processors in.

 

You can also add up to 5 chassis instead of 3...

[glennda]

You can easily expand the P2012FC but you need to take into consideration the age of the primary SAN along with its warranty status, no point spending 5/6k on additional storeage now if the Primary SAN is say 3/4 years old (you don't state what generation you P2000 is). Then IMHO its not worth expanding the san in that scenario, if its only a couple of years old then it could be.

[john]

The SAN @badders has will be 3-4 years old if it is still the one that was got when I worked with him So adding disks is one option, but as you have said considering age, warranty etc need to be considered. @Domino has quite a lot of these things dotted about and if they are anything like HP Servers if looked after IE kept in the right conditions they will probably just go on and on and if you can swap the controllers for newer units that means your nearly changing the main parts of the system so could be worth looking into those options

 

From my viewpoint with that I would add a disk tray or look at EMC kit, I know @kmount and @linescanner at Cutter have used some EMC kit and had great performance and I think if I was SAN buying now I would be getting an EMC unit.

[linescanner]

New EMC VNXe 3150 or the 3300 are good bits of kit. EMC are quite aggressive with the pricing in to Edu also.

 

Not sure I would bother with Fibre