Broad-based black empowered ICT distributor Pinnacle Micro - renowned for its Proline range of desktop PCs - has scored an industry first by installing an optimised storage solution from Supermicro at wireless application server (WASP) company, Integrat, in a deal worth an estimated R300 000.
The storage servers are said to be 30% to 40% less expensive, and efficient, per terabyte than other storage products, said Supermicro product manager at Pinnacle, Francois Lottering.
The first storage box can take up to 24 hard drives, but can scale up to 125 drives in total. Integrat has initially opted for 28 drives.
"The cost per terabyte is between 30% and 40% less then the traditional Storage Area Network (SAN)," said Lottering. "Overall, the solution is also easier to install and expand due to the SAS expander technology - making usage that much easier."
He said the Supermicro UIO SAS RAID card product line addresses the need for both internal and external storage configurations, with flexible solutions to meet the complex demands of today's ever-increasing storage requirements.
Leveraging the latest SAS controllers from Intel and LSI, the company has created a complete line of UIO SAS RAID cards for high-performance, high-density and fault-tolerant storage solutions.
When combined with Supermicro storage utilities, these solutions provide a variety of configuration options and controls for the system host, SAS controllers, as well as the logical and physical drive level of the disk enclosures.
Pinnacle Micro started its relationship with Supermicro two years ago when it signed a southern African distribution agreement to distribute the company's world-renowned server range, which are "now making inroads" in the local server market, said Lottering.
Tim Humphreys-Davies, sales and marketing director of Pinnacle Micro, said the server range used to be marketed as the 'Proline by Supermicro' brand. "We will now be branding them separately - and we will be focusing aggressively on the server market in SA, where we believe we can make significant inroads with our Supermicro server range."
Supermicro, founded in 1993, concluded its IPO last year and has committed "additional resources to southern Africa" in order to enhance it penetration in the region.
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