Dell drives external storage standardisation

Dell, EMC, Intel and LSI Logic today announced the Storage Bridge Bay Working Group (SBB), a cooperative, non-profit effort created to drive standardisation in entry-level external storage.

The SBB expects to speed the delivery of emerging storage technologies, such as iSCSI (Internet small computer systems interface), SAS (serial attached SCSI), archiving and virtual tape libraries.

Several other key storage industry players have joined the founding members including Adaptec, AMCC, Aristos Logic, Astute Networks, Dot Hill Systems Corp, Neterion, RASILIENT Systems, Seagate and Xyratex.

Initially, the SBB will focus on developing and distributing specifications for standardising external disk subsystem technologies.

"With the advent of an SBB standard, a wider base of customers will have the opportunity to deploy advanced storage capabilities previously limited to enterprise-class solutions," said Bill Dawkins, chairman of the Storage Bridge Bay Working Group. "This collaborative effort among industry leaders marks the next advancement in storage - one in which standardised storage products are available quicker, giving customers more choice, value and a wider range of technology features."

The new working group will define mechanical and electrical interface requirements between storage arrays and the controller card that give the array its identity - identities such as JBOD (just a bunch of disks), RAID (redundant array of independent disks), iSCSI, Fibre Channel SAN and NAS (networked attached storage). As a result, a storage controller card based on the SBB specification will be able to fit, connect and electrically operate within an SBB-compliant storage array.

This process is expected to simplify the engineering and design process for independent hardware vendors (IHVs) and system vendors, yielding significant improvements for customers by decreasing costs and providing quicker access to new storage technology. With standardised SBB technology, IHVs can create a single controller design that is compatible with a number of disk enclosures, lowering development costs. With shortened development cycles enabled by the SBB specification, system vendors can devote more of their efforts on innovation and driving simplicity.