I strongly disagree with "FC ... almost a no brainer".
As somebody in the business who deals with OEMs, VARs, and enduser's, I assure you that the vast majority of resellers out there aren't prepared to sell FC.
They can't optimize it; don't know how to backup/recover; are clueless on high availability (DMP products); never heard of a fibrechannel analyzer, or know why you might need one; don't know anything about security; couldn't set up a stable shared filesystem, and so on. They think FC is plug and play, like SCSI. They also try to shove FC down the throats of an enduser when a SCSI subsystem might be substantially cheaper or even faster. A good qualified FC specialist will also demand a six-figure salary, so the small guys just go without.
Proof? Look at the certification requirements from people like Compaq, and HP for VARs to sell their products .. you know, the ones making money with storage.
Then look at dothill, that will sell to anybody with money. They are losing their butts, and it is partially because of RMAs, post-sales support costs, because untrained people can't get it to work properly. These VARs and endusers expect dothill to bail them out, or take perfectly good product back because the bozo configuring it isn't qualified.
Now, of course, consider the european marketplace which is 6-12 months behind where the US is on FC penetration and resources.
OK, off the soapbox.
David |
