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Technology Stocks : Son of SAN - Storage Networking Technologies -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: David A. Lethe who wrote (1423)	8/13/1999 8:46:00 PM
From: J Fieb	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4808

computerworld.com Storage-Area Networks By Christy Walker August 9, 1999 A Hollywood production company needs to maintain millions of frames of film from a blockbuster movie. An international bank accesses customer records from its terabyte data warehouse in a flash. A prepress organization manages volumes of multimedia materials and shares data with marketing agencies and design departments. All are examples of how a storage-area network (SAN) can improve storage availability and management. A SAN is a high-speed network or system that allows different kinds of storage devices such as tape libraries and disk arrays to be shared by all users through network servers. SANs -- coupled with Fibre Channel technology -- promise performance and administration benefits over traditional LAN-based storage. Because a SAN acts independently from the LAN, LAN overhead and traffic are reduced, and overall network performance is improved. Today, in the typical LAN deployment, the storage device sits directly behind the server and communicates through bus connections such as SCSI. Each server has its own proprietary storage architecture and, in essence, each pair becomes an island. Because communication among storage devices occurs through servers and over the LAN, the LAN can take quite a beating from the large amount of traffic. Furthermore, storage management is difficult because users must know exactly where the storage is if they want to access it or perform data backup. With a SAN, storage is accessed centrally. Because a SAN creates a pool of storage that can be shared by multiple servers, any server can access any storage device. It enables the sharing and changing of large amounts of data dynamically, regardless of operating system or application. "Customers want a central, large data repository for disk [arrays] and tape drives that is connected to a network that a user community can draw from," says Kevin Reardon, director of strategy at IBM Technology Group in Somers, N.Y. "With a SAN, backup of that data becomes automatic, and consolidation of [storage] gets centralized." Generally, a SAN communicates via pipelines that consist of an interface called Fibre Channel, a technology for quickly transmitting data between computer devices. Fibre Channel goes beyond SCSI and enables corporations to extend the distance between two connected items and run more signals faster on a single cable. For instance, where SCSI copper cables can extend 50 meters, Fibre Channels can run up to 10 kilometers, Reardon says. But there are drawbacks to SANs. One problem is "there is an incredible range in price," says Jim Porter, president of Mountain View, Calif.-based Disk/Trend Inc. A SAN with of a couple of servers could cost between $20,000 and $30,000. A high-end SAN could cost $4 million or $5 million depending upon the capacity and nature of the system, Porter says. "Almost every company today has serious storage needs," says Scott Robinson, vice president of engineering at Datalink Inc., a storage integrator in Minneapolis. "Industries like prepress and video editing were early SAN adopters, but going forward it's going to be broadly based." The colossal amount of multimedia data and the need to meet continuous, relentless deadlines made the film production industry a prime candidate for early SAN adoption. Ray Feeney, president of RFX Inc., a systems integrator in Hollywood, works with film studios, postproduction facilities and special-effects houses and has seen a growing demand for SAN infrastructures. "Part of the promise of SANs is the ability to access data from remote stations just as fast as anyone else accessing it, and to be potentially faster than a dedicated local disk," Feeney says. "However, the full benefit of SANs won't be visible to end users until applications are written so that groups of people can access the data without delay. It would mean [for instance] that the way a production team works would be totally different." Presently, for most users, the most immediate result will be an improvement in storage response time. Because the traffic is taken off the LAN and put on the SAN, the bandwidth of the overall network will also go up, Reardon says. Walker is a freelance writer in Cambridge, Mass.

To: David A. Lethe who wrote (1423)	8/16/1999 12:48:00 PM
From: J Fieb	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 4808

Here's Vixel's IPO...... Monday August 16, 11:53 am Eastern Time Data storage co. Vixel sets terms of IPO WASHINGTON, Aug 16 (Reuters) - Vixel Corp., whose software products and services allow data storage devices to connect to one or more computer systems allowing for high-speed data exchange, said Monday it planned to offer 3.7 million common shares in an initial public offering. The shares may be priced in the $10-12 per share and trade on Nasdaq under the symbol (Nasdaq:VIXL - news), Vixel, based in Bothell, Wash., said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Estimated net proceeds of $37 million will be used to repay a $2 million promissory note, for general corporate purposes and repayment of other debt, said Vixel, whose solutions are used in storage area networks, designed to interconnect computer systems and data storage devices. If there is heavy demand for the shares, then underwriters BancBoston Robertson Stephens, Bear Stearns and Needham & Co. have an over-allotment option on 555,000 more shares. Vixel primarily markets and sells to original equipment manufacturers, or OEMs, which are companies that combine their own products with someone else's and the sells the combination under the OEM's brands. It also sells to resellers. Sun Microsystems Inc. (Nasdaq:SUNW - news), Compaq Computer Corp. (NYSE:CPQ - news) and Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE:HWP - news) accounted for 34.4 percent, 19.8 percent and 11.8 percent, respectively, of Vixel's total revenue for the first six months ended July 4, the filing said. In fiscal 1998 sales to its two top customers, Sun and HP, represented 54.4 percent and 12.3 percent of total revenue, respectively, said Vixel, which currently derives substantially all of its revenue from sales of entry-level hubs and transceivers. Vixel's president and chief executive officer is James McCluney, who once held various vice presidential posts at Apple Computer Inc. (Nasdaq:AAPL - news). The chairman is Gregory Olbright, who founded Vixel and has served as a director since its inception in 1991, the filing said. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- More Quotes and News: Nasdaq:VIXL - news Apple Computer Inc (Nasdaq:AAPL - news) Compaq Computer Corp (NYSE:CPQ - news) Hewlett-Packard Co (NYSE:HWP - news) Sun Microsystems Inc (Nasdaq:SUNW - news) Related News Categories: