Software Technology VS Hardware Technology

In the Enterprise environment Hardware design & implementation was happening at never before pace. each hardware vendors (IBM, HP, Intel, AMD, SUN, Dell, EMC2, NetApp & 1000's of many more small & big enterprises) tried to come up with highly competitive technologies & they did succeeded in their achievements to a larger extent.
The Hardware innovations continue to evolve as it is happening from past few decades with even higher pace. the advancement in the multiple-core processor technologies being implemented by Intel & other vendors will continue to boast other hardware (servers, Switches, routers, storage appliances etc.) innovations in future.
But another interesting point i like to make here is about "Enterprise Software Technology". in the recent decade, Enterprise Software does not mean just Operating System (OS), it is more than just OS, we have seen enterprise Management software, Network management software, Telecom network management software, Wireless management software to name a few.
very recently, VMWARE's virtualization software success has taken the Enterprise industries by surprise & it has resulted in "Software Enterprise Technology" showdown by some of the biggest software players such as Microsoft, Xensource,SUN, IBM, HP etc. this is interesting as the enterprise software fever is catching up like wild fire, more & more competitors are born every day.
Software being easy and cost effective Technology to design & implement, there is going to be Enterprise software Revolution in the cards. one of the first sign was Virtualization software of VMware & now Microsoft windows 2008 OS.
very recently, in the just concluded VMware's VMWorld conference in Las vegas, USA. VMware announced that it is building nothing less than a "virtual datacenter OS" -- VDC OS for short -- that will eventually make traditional operating systems "all but disappear."
This is the next sign of Enterprise Software Revolution that i am talking about.

If you like to know more details of it, check out http://weblog.infoworld.com/fatalexception/archives/2008/09/vmware_proposes.html

Latest Storage market status - Q2 2008

HP, IBM, Dell, SUN are all top global enterprises with broad range of products, here i have current market status for these companies in External Storage segment only.

According to analyst group IDC, Despite tough conditions in the U.S. economy, which have decreased demand for everything from new homes to semiconductors, the market for computer data storage Relevant
Products/Services systems is going strong.
EMC continued to lead the external disk storage systems market with 21.7 percent of the revenue share, followed by IBM at 13.1 percent, HP at 12.9 percent, Dell at 9.2 percent, NetApp at 8.0 percent and Hitachi at 7.6 percent. Of the top five suppliers, EMC and NetApp posted the strongest year-over-year revenue growth at 19.7 percent and 17.2 percent, respectively.
The Open SAN market grew 15.5 percent year-over-year, with EMC leading with 23.9 percent of revenue share, followed by HP at 16.7 percent. The NAS market experienced year-over-year growth of 23.5 percent, with EMC leading with 39.8 percent of revenue share, followed by NetApp at 28.5 percent. The iSCSI SAN market showed year-over-year revenue growth of 93.9 percent, with Dell leading the market (due to its acquisition of EqualLogic) with 32.8 percent of the revenue share, followed by NetApp at 14.6 percent and EMC at 14.1 percent.

**********for more information check out http://www.echannelline.com/usa/story.cfm?item=23687 *******************

IBM's Storage product Buzz:

In Sep 2008, IBM announces 30 new products and services, saying that it took an investment of $2 billion, three years, and 2,500 engineers and other specialists from nine countries to complete the project.
IBM said that all the new products and services fall under the auspices of its New Enterprise Data Center strategy, which utilizes intellectual property IBM has acquired in the last two years.

Few of them are listed below & you can get more info from http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/storage/product/showcase/index.html
Newly-announced storage products
IBM XIV Storage System
IBM TS7650G ProtecTIER De-duplication Gateway
IBM System Storage TS2900 Tape Autoloader
IBM System Storage DS5000 series
IBM System Storage DS8000 R4.0/4.1
IBM System Storage TS3500 high-density frames
IBM N Series N6000
IBM N Series SnapManager for Virtual Infrastructure
IBM N Series OSSV SnapVault

Latest information about IBM's DS5000 product here http://storagetrendz.blogspot.com/2008/09/ibm-new-ds5000-storage-product-released.html

IBM New DS5000 Storage Product released:

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by the Blogger and those providing comments are theirs alone, and we are not responsible for the accuracy of any of the information supplied by the Bloggers.

Most of the Netizens beleive IBM DS5000 storage product came from the acquisition of XIV storage company by IBM [check http://www.xivstorage.com/].
but i differ with this wide perception. the DS5000 which is released by IBM in sep, 2008 looks to me as an extension of IBM's old products in the mid-range (ex:DS4000 series).
yet again i like to differ myself saying it is not extension, it is whole new enterprise storage architecture and silent features are given below:
* offers improved performance.
* Scalability of FC/SATA disks upto 448.
* Boost up with 8G FC & 10G iSCSI connectivity.
* PCI-Express (PCI-e) bus architecture & so on.
* Supports RAID levels RAID 0, 1, 3, 5, 6 and 10 (RAID 1+0).
* Supports up to 2048 volumes & 2048 host logins.
* Premium features FlashCopy (up to 16 copies per volume), VolumeCopy, Remote Volume Mirroring (up to 128 pairs).
* Cache memory of 8GB to 16GB cache & USB Cache backup memory for Power failures.
* IBM DS5000 series offers two models
DS5100
DS5300
Obviously for EMC & HP bloggers, DS5000 series looks no threat to their Clariion & EVA products respectively but there are specific indications
that DS5000 series future offerings will be definitely going to cut the EMC & HP business in this segment (Keep watch on this).
the beauty of this product is that it has the potential to bridge the gap between IBM's Mid-range & high range (DS8000) product offerings.

The pictures associated with this post gives you more performance & scalability offering of DS5000

IBM Storage Products

NOTE: IBM has comprehensive range of storage hardware & software products such as servers, SAN, NAS, Switch, Tape libraries, switches & SAN arrays, NAS devices etc. so here am listing only few storage specific products.

IBM Disk storage subsystems
Enterprise systems - DS6000 and DS8000 family
DS6000 series
DS8000 series
DCS9550

Mid-range systems - DS4000 family
DS5000
DS4800
DS4700 Express
DS4200

Entry level systems - DS3000 family
DS3200
DS3300
DS3400

Enterprise SAN directors [High end switches]
For highest availability and scalability enterprise solutions.
IBM System Storage SAN768B
IBM TotalStorage SAN256B
IBM TotalStorage SAN140M
IBM TotalStorage SAN256M

Mid-range SAN switches
For scalable, affordable SMB and enterprise solutions.
IBM System Storage SAN80B-4
IBM System Storage SAN64B-2
IBM System Storage SAN40B-4
IBM System Storage SAN32B-3

Entry SAN switches
For simple, affordable small and medium business (SMB) solutions.
IBM System Storage SAN24B-4 Express
IBM TotalStorage SAN16B-2

IBM Express Model SAN switches
For affordable, simple-to-use small and medium business (SMB) solutions.
IBM System Storage SAN24B-4
IBM TotalStorage SAN16B-2

Tivoli Storage Manager
Manage risk through complete storage management with enhanced performance and access for Sequential Disk. Manage complexity with encryption key management. used by more than 21,000 customers.

OEM Storage Management softwares
Basically OEM storage product software marketed with IBM logo.

IBM TotalStorage Productivity Center
Identify, evaluate, control and predict the growth of data through its lifecycle to meet storage service levels.

IBM System Storage Virtualization
Designed to help simplify storage infrastructure, optimize storage utilization, and enable business to adapt quickly and dynamically to variable environments