Dell introduces storage area network appliance

Dell has announced a storage area network (SAN) appliance with the performance, availability and data protection features typically found in higher-end systems, but with the low cost and ease-of-use advantages inherent in appliance devices.

The Dell PowerVault 530F gives customers the means to keep data available around the clock by creating exact copies in local and remote locations. Through `remote mirroring`, data is written simultaneously to both local and remote storage systems, ensuring identical and concurrent information at all times.

The PowerVault 530F leverages software technology from StorageApps, a provider of SAN applications and appliances, and enterprise server technology from Dell. Dell is the No. 2 provider of Standard Intel Architecture Servers worldwide in terms of unit shipments according to the most recent quarterly research International Data Corporation.

"Customers increasingly require data centre levels of protection for all of their information resources, but want the cost-advantage and flexibility inherent in industry standard systems," says Sean Wainer, Dell`s product manager for enterprise products. "The PowerVault 530F provides both new levels of data protection for Windows-based storage area networks and simpler storage management, all at a fraction of the cost charged for proprietary solutions."

By combining hardware and software into a pre-configured appliance, the PowerVault 530F lowers configuration costs and enables enterprise customers to quickly implement a SAN in a variety of environments. Combining the PowerVault 530F with PowerVault Fibre-channel switches enables a SAN configuration of up to 20 servers and four storage arrays, with a capacity of over 17 terabytes. Rapid implementation of the PowerVault 530F is facilitated by Dell OpenManage, a collection of industry-standard tools and technologies designed to ease the installation and administration of Dell systems.

When added to a SAN, the PowerVault 530F moves data efficiently between the storage and server units, with advanced disaster recovery features that include:

• Remote Mirroring

  - Supports real-time disaster recovery for fast access and recovery of business-critical data at a significantly lower cost than competitive storage offerings - allowing customers to develop a disaster recovery configuration to ensure safe access to data.

• Point-in-Time Copy

  - Provides a more robust disaster recovery solution by taking a "snapshot" of the file pointers that represent the data and copying each pointer to another location - a space-saving process that is significantly faster than copying the data in its entirety.

• Three-Way Mirroring

  - Increases the availability and disaster recovery features for backup, data warehouse loading and application testing by providing a third copy of data.

• LUN Masking/LUN Mapping

  - Creates a pool of storage resources rather than designating specific storage for each server, enabling customers in Microsoft Windows-based environments to allocate their storage resources more efficiently without reconfiguring the entire SAN.

• High Availability

  - Provides system and data availability features for a variety of customer configurations through fully redundant components, dual data paths with automatic fail over, and clustering support.

Dell provides a comprehensive support and service plan with its PowerVault PV530F appliance including 24 hour online, email and telephone technical support and a 3 year maintenance service.