New Article -
FC SAN SSDs
Editor:-
September 13, 2008 -
Storagesearch.com today published a new article and directory on the
subject of - "Fibre-Channel SSDs."
"I've tracked
the SAN storage market
since the first commercially launched products in
1994" said editor
Zsolt Kerekes. "As the number of market-active
SSD oems listed on
Storagesearch approaches 90
companies I thought I should make it easier for readers to disentagle the info
related to this important market segment - which was getting lost in tables
deep in our SSD
Buyers Guide. The new SAN SSD page lists all current vendors and also
explains how this market fits in a historical context." ...read the article
Zetta Raises $10 million Funding
SUNNYVALE, Calif. - September 12, 2008 - Zetta
today announced that it has closed a $10.7 million Series A financing round
led by venture capital firms Sigma Partners and Foundation Capital.
Zetta
plans to use the funding to expand product development, marketing and
operations. Zetta was founded by industry veterans Lou Montulli, Jeff
Whitehead, Jason Harrison and Jeff Treuhaft.
Editor's
comments:- Zetta's home page contains no useful information yet.
See
also:- VCs in storage
Sonnet Launches Speedy SATA ExpressCard for Notebooks
IRVINE,
CA - September 12, 2008 - Sonnet Technologies today announced the Tempo
SATA Pro ExpressCard/34, a dual port SATA host controller for notebooks.
It
enables users to connect from 1 to 10
SATA
hard drives to any
compatible notebook computer with an ExpressCard/34 or /54 slot. Suitable for
video capture and editing it supports sustained data throughput of up to
200MB/sec. OS compatibility includes MacBook Pro systems running Mac OS 10.5
and 10.4, as well as with notebooks running Windows Vista and XP SP2. The
Sonnet card will be available in October at a suggested retail price of
$299.95.
...Sonnet profile,
consumer SSDs
SDK Starts Shipments of 1.89-Inch 120 GB HD Media
Tokyo, Japan -
September 11, 2008 - Showa Denko K.K. (SDK) has started commercial
shipments of 1.89-inch hard disk media with storage capacity of 120GB per disk.
To the best of our knowledge, our new 1.89-inch HD media have the
world's highest storage capacity for this size available on the market today.
The new product has been developed by improving the magnetic layer for 1.89-inch
80 gigabyte HD media commercialized in August 2007. SDK is the world's only
commercial producer of 1.89-inch HD media.
...SDK profile,
1.8" storage drives
Samsung's OneDRAM Accelerates Multimedia Phones
Seoul,
Korea - September 11, 2008 - Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. today
announced that its embedded memory, OneDRAM is being used in its new SGH-L870
handset was launched in Europe last month.
The 512 megabit
OneDRAM will be mass produced for multiple communication carriers in several
other smart phones worldwide in the 4th quarter of 2008. Samsung has also begun
sampling a gigabit OneDRAM.
Samsung's single chip OneDRAM receives data from the modem
processor at 533MB/s and forwards it to the application processor at 1.06GB/s
which enables a 10x increase in the data processing speeds between the 2
processors in mobile handsets. The OneDRAM interface complies with the JEDEC
low-power, double-data-rate and eliminates the need for
DRAM and SRAM chips as
buffer memory.
...Samsung profile,
storage interface chips
Editor's
comments:-
OneDRAM
is a dual port RAM chip that reduces the PCB footprint and increases data
throughput between processors in a mobile phone. Dual port RAMs can
speedily solve tricky design problems and they let you optimise functional
blocks in a product with minimum interaction. It's a long established
architectural concept. I used this technique to interface 2 different
technology embedded processors in a product I designed in 1978.
30
years ago no one imagined that phones would become as capable as they are
today. We used to laugh at the communicators used in the first TV series of
Star Trek when they said "Beam me up Scotty."
- They'll never be able to make them that small - we said - wrongly convinced
that the battery alone would have to be bigger than the entire phone.
Soliware Brings 2.5" SSD oem Head Count to 39
Editor:- September 11, 2008 - as
you can on our main SSD Page - the number of active SSD oems has
crept up to 84.
This week I've added 2 oems and one
SSD VAR. They don't
all rate news announcements.
Soliware is a new oem
whose website is starting to flesh out. They bring the total of
2.5" SSD oems up
to 39. Although some of these are rebranded versions of each other.
ATTO Ships First Quad-Channel 8Gbps Fibre Channel HBA
Amherst, NY -
September 10, 2008 -
ATTO Technology, Inc. announced the release of the industry's first
quad 8Gbps Fibre Channel PCIe HBA.
With aggregate speeds of up
to 3,200 MB/sec. for reads or writes, the
FC-84EN is designed
for intensive data applications, including 2K and 4K film editing, tape
streaming and backup, rich content delivery, and complex database environments.
Driver support includes Windows, Linux and Mac OS X . ...ATTO profile,
Fibre-channel adapters
the SATABeast Shall Lie Peacefully with the Cougar
Thousand Oaks & Campbell,
Calif. - Sept. 10, 2008 - ONStor Inc. and Nexsan today
announced that the 2 companies have entered into a worldwide OEM agreement that
expands the companies' channel presence.
ONStor will incorporate
Nexsan's SATABeast and SATABoy storage systems into its Pantera line of NAS
products. In addition, ONStor has certified the Nexsan SATABeast with the ONStor
Bobcat and Cougar NAS gateways.
...Nexsan profile,
...ONStor profile,
Disk to disk backup,
Animal Brands
and Metaphors in the Storage Market
Toshiba Ships 240GB 1.8" HDDs
IRVINE,
Calif. - September 9, 2008 - Toshiba Storage Device Division today
announced the world's first dual-platter 240GB 1.8-inch PATA HDDs.
The 240GB unit uses 33% less power than Toshiba's previous
generation 160GB 3,600 RPM 1.8" model and is aimed at light-weight
mobile PC applications and high-end digital video camcorders, which require high
capacity and ruggedness to protect users' valuable digital assets. The new
series (which all spin at 4,200 RPM) also includes 80GB and 120GB
single-platter models. Toshiba's new 1.8" HDDs will be incorporated into
consumer products shipping this holiday season. ...Toshiba profile,
HDDs,
1.8" drives
NEC Announces 2nd Generation HYDRAstor
Santa
Clara, Calif. - September 9, 2008 - NEC Corp today unveiled the 2nd
generation of its HYDRAstor HS8 grid storage platform
This
HYDRAstor grid platform evolves with new technologies - without forcing the
user to start a new grid system, without data migration, provisioning, forklift
upgrades, application downtimes and data loss. HYDRAstor's unique "community
of smart nodes" enables IT to non-disruptively ride both technology and
growth curves so that a single storage grid can continually evolve with greener,
denser, and faster nodes.
Each new NEC HYDRAstor HS8-2000 Accelerator
Node provides 300MB/s performance, 12TB raw capacity (which NEC says is 157TB
of effective capacity based on a 20:1
deduplication
ratio) and a default protection 3x greater than RAID 5. ...NEC profile
Lexar 's 300x 16GB CF
Fremont,
CA - September 9, 2008 - Lexar Media announced imminent availabality
of the Lexar Professional UDMA 300x 16GB CF card.
Speed-rated at
300x, which represents a minimum sustained write speed of 45MB per second, the
new CF card is aimed at professional photographers and photo enthusiasts.
...Lexar profile
Tarmin Technologies Appoints US Sales Director
Ongar, UK - September 9, 2008 - Tarmin
Technologies announced today that Bruce Holbert has joined Tarmin as
director of sales, North America.
Holbert was most recently partner accounts manager for national
accounts at EMC. Prior to
that, Holbert spent over 15 years at several start-up and reseller-oriented
companies where he was involved in numerous partnership, channel management, and
direct sales roles.
...Tarmin profile
Editor's
comments:- I'd never heard of this company before getting this press release
so I read some of their
whitepapers.
The papers seem sensible, but bland, and I'm not sure why the world needs
another archiving company. Their
expert opinion
page includes comments from various
storage soothsayers if
you want to read more.
Axstor Launches2U 8 Port iSCSI Storage
Coventry, UK - September 9,
2008 - Axstor, announces the Ai-Pro 5108 - a 2U, 12 bay fast iSCSI
storage system.
With 8x 1Gb
iSCSI ports, the Ai-Pro
5108 can deliver more than 80,000 IOPs from a single controller, and a data
transfer rate of more than 800MB/s. It's fully dual-ported to ensure that there
is no single point of failure. Initially supporting up to 60 drives and 90TB
capacity, the system can be expanded to support 128 drives with the planned
release of new firmware in January 2009. ,,,Axstor profile
Fusion-io Unveils fast NAS SSD
San Diego, Calif. -
September 8, 2008 - Fusion-io unveiled the ioSAN - a 10GbE or
Infiniband attached flash SSD on PCIe form factor.
Using a
standards-based, memory-speed protocol over either 10GigE or 40GBps QDR
InfiniBand, the
ioSAN shares ioMemory capacity between servers. With latencies of less than 2
microseconds, the ioSAN incorporates an integrated network interface that can
dynamically alternate between 10Gb/s Ethernet or 40Gb/s quad data rate
InfiniBand. The built-in network interface makes it easy to create networked
storage across servers with increased performance and flexibility, and with zero
footprint. This networked storage is extremely easy to integrate and manage
within existing server infrastructure. Prior to general availability of the
ioSAN, Fusion-io is inviting innovative and visionary companies to join them as
they launch their 3rd party development program at the beginning of next year.
"With
this development, everything you thought you knew about
SSD and
storage networking is no
longer true," said David Flynn, CTO of Fusion-io. "The ioSAN fuses SSD
with storage networking, combining the best of direct-attached and storage
networking with the best of SSD and traditional storage. With this revolutionary
advancement, Fusion-io has commoditized high-performance network storage in the
same way that companies like NVIDIA and ATI commoditized high-performance
graphics processing. Fantastic applications of this technology are now beginning
to emerge."
...Fusion-io profile,
PCIe SSDs
Editor's
comments:- Fusion-io's full press release text says this is "the
world's first networked enterprise SSD."
That's not strictly
correct because fiber-channel
SSDs have been available from many oems for over a decade. And it's not the
first "ethernet NAS SSD" either. We ran an ad here in 2002 for
the NAS-168F
from IEI.
And
it's not the first "enterprise NAS SSD". In April 2008
Nimbus Data Systems
announced an SSD acceleration option for its
Breeze Hybrid
series of multi-protocol 10GbE IP storage systems.
And it's not
the first InfiniBand SSD either. That was
Texas Memory Systems
in 2005.
What is special about Fusion-io's new product is that
it could become the first high performance native NAS SSD to cross the chasm
between PR-ware and success in the market. Although high speed NAS SSDs have
been announced before on these storage news pages by various companies in years
gone by none of them left a deep impression in the market. The reason? - the
benefits of SSD acceleration were not cost effective when channeled through
slow ethernet networks. The low cost of Fusion-io's flash array coupled with
its high speed and 10GbE interface could place this product in new
territory in the SSD roadmap.
Intel Ships Me-too 1.8" & 2.5" MLC SSDs
SANTA
CLARA, Calif. - September 8, 2008 - Intel Corp has begun shipping 1.8"
and 2.5" SATA MLC flash SSDs for laptop and desktop computers.
The
Intel X18-M and X25-M Mainstream SATA SSDs are available in 80GB capacities,
with 160GB versions sampling in the 4th quarter of this year. The 80GB drive
achieves up to 250MB per second read speeds, up to 70MB per second write speeds
and 85-microsecond read latency for fast performance. The 80GB version is priced
at $595 for quantities up to 1,000. T
...Intel profile,
1.8" SSDs,
2.5 inch SSDs
Editor's
comments:- these are low performance products which would rate a yawn if
announced by any other company. The market is waiting to see how Intel will
deliver on its high performance SSD pledges. The company says it will announce a
faster SLC SSD line in the next 90 days.
Storage Software Market Grew 14% in Q208
FRAMINGHAM, Mass
- September 8, 2008 - According to IDC - the worldwide storage software
market experienced its 19th consecutive quarter of year-over-year growth in the
second quarter of 2008 with revenues of $3.1 billion, a 14% increase
over the same quarter one year ago.
This was the first time that
the worldwide storage software market surpassed $3 billion in revenues in a
single quarter.
"The overall storage software market grew at a faster rate in
the second quarter than in the usually slow first quarter of the year. The
year-over-year growth for 2Q08 was 14.2% compared to 9.4% for 1Q08. Most of the
top vendors experienced accelerated growth in the second quarter, which helps to
explain the strong Q2 results," said Michael Margossian, research analyst,
Storage Software at IDC. "The smaller vendors also had a strong quarter,
but had less impact on the overall market than the top vendors." "
EMC led the overall market with 24.2% revenue share. Symantec took the 2nd
position with 19.1% revenue share, while IBM finished in the 3rd position with
13.3% revenue share. NetApp finished in the 4th position with 7.8% revenue share
while HP and CA rounded out the top 5 in a statistical tie with 4.8% and 4.4%
revenue share, respectively.
...IDC profile,
Storage Software ISVs
Samsung SanDisk Synergy Dissected
Editor:
- September 8, 2008 - in his latest blog Gregory Wong founder of Forward
Insights analyzes the business arguments for and against a rumored Samsung
acquisition of SanDisk.
...Forward Insights
profile, SSD
analysts, Acquired
storage companies |
