HDS Beefs Up Unified Storage 100 platform

Today I want to highlight one of the recent  product enhancements by our partner, Hitachi Data Systems (HDS).  

The update centers around Hitachi's Unified Storage 100 platform.  When HDS first introduced the HUS100 offerings, they consisted of three products.  The entry-level HUS110, mid-level HUS130, and the mini-enterprise HUS150.

In December 2012, HDS modified the physical specifications of the HUS130 controllers.  The major change was upgrading the cache from 16GB to 32GB by replacing the 4GB dimms with 8GB dimms.  This shrinks the performance gap between the HUS150 and HUS130 to almost nothing.

The HUS130 is still limited to half the backend SAS links than the HUS150 (16 to the HUS150's 32.)  So unless the growth requirements for your array exceed 756TB of NearLine SAS, 216TB of SAS, or 96TB of SSD (capacities are raw) then the HUS130 gives you all of the performance and features of the HUS150 at a smaller price point.

Another major enhancement is to the code on the HUS platform controllers.  The FC Queue Depth has been doubled from 512 to 1024.  A customer can have all of the cache and SSD's in the world, but if the command queue is unable to handle the number of commands, the performance will be limited.  

The code update also has introduced the Memory Management Layer.  HDS mid-range arrays in the past used to reserve cache memory for all software installed regardless if it was in use or not, i.e. snapshots, thus having a negative impact on performance due to a lesser availability of cache.  

The HUS Memory Management Layer allows for limiting the system area to applications actually in use leaving an overwhelming percentage of cache available where it is needed most.  User data.

These updates all culminate in one thing.  

Customers are able to maximize application performance at a price point previously unavailable in the mid-range array market.  

And that is a pretty compelling story.

36.1 Miles + Go Big Red = ???

Lets get this thing going again, shall we?

Hmmm...topics.  

I could write about the current state of technology as we see it here at Soccour.  

Sounds pretty boring for a first time in a long time post.

Or I could write about some of the latest product releases by our partners and the cool features that have been added to them.

Maybe next time.

How about a Riddle post? 

Let's do it....

How does 36.1 miles + Go Big Red = Innovation & Opportunity???

Not really a fair riddle is it?  :-)

It struck me as I logged in to finally update the SoccourBlue blog that Blogger was created by a company called Pyra Labs.  Pyra Labs was co-founded by two young people by the name of Evan Williams and Meg Hourihan.

I don't have a ton of background on Ms. Hourihan, but there is plenty on Mr. Williams due to his eventual sale of Pyra Labs and Blogger to Google ten years ago in February, 2003 and then co-founding Twitter with Jack Dorsey in April 2007.  Not a shabby résumé.

Evan Williams grew up on a farm outside of Clarks, NE.  Population 363 as of 2011.  

Now I'm a small-town guy, but 363 people is Tinytown, USA.  

It makes York, NE (Population 7984 as of 1990) where I finished high school look like a metropolis.  

Distance from Clarks, NE to York, NE?  36.1 miles.

Williams went to school at University of Nebraska-Lincoln for a year and a half prior to leaving to pursue his career.  

I partied at University of Nebraska-Lincoln about the same time prior to leaving for the US Air Force.  :-)

It goes without saying that Rural Nebraska isn't necessarily reputed as a technology-titan incubator, but here we have one of the true innovators of the Internet Era emerging from the Nebraska cornfields and changing the world.

36.1 miles + Go Big Red = Innovation & Opportunity.  

That equation tells me we should always keep our eyes open, might be someone near us that will move mountains.

Next post...Soccour's take on some of the recent product refreshes/releases from our partners.

Oracle to Itanium...So long, farewell, auf wiedersehn, goodbye

Oracle has joined RedHat and Microsoft in discontinuing software development for Intel's Itanium processor.

http://www.oracle.com/us/corporate/press/346696


Is this the final nail in the coffin for Itanium?  It has battled and survived in a market longer than I first thought they would many years ago.

The processor industry is accustomed to leap-frogging competitors, and the death of a processor is rarely ever laid at the feet of another processor despite the numerous predictions of doom.  (See AMD/Intel)

But a number of processors have gone the way of the dodo due to lack of ISV development.  No Apps = No customers.

Thanks for playing Itanium.

The other interesting aspect to this announcement is the escalation of the feud between HP and Oracle after Oracle had snagged Mark Hurd.  No love lost between these two companies at the moment...

1st Time...

A leader in technology resale, Soccour Solutions entered the blogosphere....in 2011 You can't say that Soccour isn't on the cutting edge!    :-)

SoccourBlue is to primarily be a technical resource for our colleagues, both customers and partners, with a dash of non-nerdy stuff from time-to-time.

Over the years we have found that our take on IT infrastructure resonates with our customers.  I think Jason Fried of 37signals said it best, "It's simple until you make it complicated."

Complexity in your IT environment = downtime.  Period.

Does that mean that Soccour can make an SAP implementation simple?  Um....no.

What it does mean is that Soccour is experienced in making the infrastructure that SAP is implemented upon simple.

It's this commitment to keeping technology simple while providing performance and availability that is the catalyst in growing Soccour into a trusted and successful partner over the ten years since we came into existence.

We look forward to sharing ideas on SoccourBlue that hopefully achieve our primary goal at Soccour, simply to help.