Douglas, HDS upgrade. Can they do these things without FC switch fabric?
Monday February 14, 8:13 am Eastern Time
Company Press Release
Hitachi Data Systems Enhances Freedom Storage 7700E
Introduces New Business Continuity Software Providing Bulletproof Foundation for E-commerce
SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 14, 2000--
Also announces boosts in performance and capacity for 7700E;
eases manageability in multi-platform and SAN environments; expands
platform support to include Linux, Windows 2000, and NetWare 5.0
Introduces new generation of high-performance disk drives
Hitachi Data Systems, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE:HIT - news), today announced new capabilities for its flagship storage subsystem - the Hitachi Freedom Storage(tm) 7700E. With these enhancements, Hitachi Data Systems brings to open-systems environments its Asynchronous Remote Copy and ShadowImage software, the 7700E's powerful data-center-proven solutions for data replication and business continuity. Other enhancements apply new technology - including high-speed, 47 gigabyte (GB) disk drives - to improve 7700E performance, capacity, and manageability. The company also announced it has extended 7700E open-systems support to include Red Hat© Linux(tm), Microsoft Windows 2000(tm), and the newest version of Novell NetWare©.
Together, these enhancements provide welcome peace of mind to Internet-based business customers, who are well aware of the significant costs that can be incurred as a result of data loss or loss of access to data. With their requirements for continuous service, scalable capacity, and ease-of-management, e-commerce and Web-hosting applications place unprecedented new demands on storage subsystems, which must significantly reduce the overall cost of ownership while increasing productivity and efficiency.
``The Hitachi Freedom Storage 7700E continues to be the storage platform by which the industry measures its progress,' said Richard Search, vice president of storage product management and marketing. ``When customers think of bulletproof storage, they think of the 7700E. It's the best, and the best is getting better. The features and functions we're introducing today bring new levels of availability, performance, and capacity to support the new Internet-driven business models. Our 'better than ever' 7700E can help e-commerce customers avoid the outages and performance deterioration that have plagued such ventures.'
The 7700E's unsurpassed reliability has earned the respect of the world's most demanding data centers and has led Hitachi Data Systems to offer an industry-first cash guarantee of 100-percent data availability.
Open Systems Business Continuity with Asynchronous Remote Copy and ShadowImage
Hitachi Data Systems brings to the open-systems world its powerful Hitachi Open Asynchronous Remote Copy function, the industry-leading business-continuity software solution, battle-proven in mainframe-based data centers. Hitachi Data Systems had previously offered Hitachi Open Synchronous Remote Copy for open-systems computing. The new Hitachi Open Asynchronous Remote Copy -generally available now for use with the 7700E -- is capable of moving large amounts of data over any distance from one 7700E to another with complete data integrity and minimal impact on performance. These copies may be used for disaster recovery, data vaulting, or business intelligence applications.
Another addition to the open-systems arsenal of tools for protecting data is Hitachi ShadowImage software, a non-disruptive means of making point-in-time copies. Enhancements for ShadowImage announced today enable open-systems users to create, at hardware speed, up to nine RAID-protected copies of data within a single 7700E subsystem. These ``cascaded' copies can be used concurrently for applications such as disaster recovery, applications testing, offline database backup, and data mining. If anything should happen to the source data, one of the copies can take its place through a reverse synchronization procedure.
Hitachi Path Manager software, also new today, eliminates the server's host bus adapter as a single point of failure by automatically detecting a failed path between the server and the 7700E. Moreover, Path Manager dynamically balances the load across multiple paths, automatically recognizing multiple paths to each logical unit of storage.
To provide higher levels of availability in Windows server environments, Hitachi Data Systems completed its testing for Microsoft Cluster Server certification under both Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000.
Open Systems Performance Management with Hitachi Dynamic Optimizer
The new Hitachi Dynamic Optimizer software announced today automatically monitors 7700E subsystem activity and applies policy-based rules to optimize performance. Depending on the level of physical disk performance, RAID type, access patterns, and other decision parameters that affect the performance of specific applications, the Dynamic Optimizer identifies optimal placement of logical volumes within the subsystem. This option is supported on Hitachi's full range of open-systems platforms and is scheduled for general availability in February.
Hitachi FlashAccess for the 7700E is a software tool for use with open-systems platforms that can lead to significant improvement in subsystem performance - as much as an 800-percent improvement in transaction-processing capability in some applications. FlashAccess enables critical data to be locked into high-speed cache within the subsystem, substantially reducing the time to retrieve frequently requested information. It is well suited for use with database log files, which are highly active and typically have relatively small block sizes. Flash Access is available now on most platforms.
Other improvements in the 7700E's design have yielded internal disk performance and throughput increases ranging from 20-percent to 50-percent when data is being read from disk. This was accomplished by streamlining operations for allocating and freeing cache memory; by reducing message traffic between processors within the subsystem to relieve congestion and eliminate potential bottlenecks; and managing control buses to better balance message traffic.
Hitachi Zone Allocation Manager controls host access to logical units (LUNs) within a 7700E subsystem in open-systems multi-platform or storage area network (SAN) environments using World Wide Names. With Zone Allocation Manager, customers restrict server access to specific LUNs, thereby securing data from unauthorized access.
New Generation of High-Speed Disk Drives
Hitachi Data Systems also announced today it will begin offering for use in the 7700E new-generation, high-speed disk drives with capacities of 47 gigabytes (GB) and 18 GB. These drives contribute to faster access to data for 7700E end users; they spin at 10,025 rpm, up 60 percent from the speed of the disk drives currently used in the 7700E. Use of the 47 GB drives raises the maximum capacity of the 7700E to 11 terabytes (TB). General availability of the 47 GB and 18 GB options is planned for April of this year.
In a statement of direction, Hitachi Data Systems today said it intends to offer a 73 GB option for the 7700E. Limited availability of this option is planned for June of this year, bringing maximum capacity of the subsystem to an industry-leading 17 TB.
Open-Systems Connectivity Expanded
In addition, Hitachi Data Systems announced today it will support use of the 7700E with processors running Red Hat Linux 6.X, Microsoft Windows 2000, and Novell NetWare 5.0 operating systems, offering users the high level of confidence they need in order to run mission-critical applications on these emerging platforms. Support for Red Hat Linux 6.X, Windows 2000, and NetWare 5.0 is in addition to existing support for Windows NT©, earlier versions of NetWare, a wide variety of UNIX©-based platforms, and OS/390© servers.
S/390 Enhancements
For users of S/390©-based mainframes, Hitachi Data Systems announced today that Hitachi NanoCopy(tm) and remote copy support for Geographically Dispersed Parallel Sysplex(tm) (GDPS) facility are both now generally available on the 7700E. In addition, support for Parallel Access Volumes (PAV) and Multiple Allegiance (MA) is planned for June 2000. PAV and MA reduce queuing and significantly increase performance in S/390 systems for applications that require simultaneous access to the same volume at the same time.
About Hitachi Data Systems
Recognized as a leading provider of business solutions for the world's most IT-intensive corporations, Hitachi Data Systems offers technical services, multi-platform storage subsystems, and the industry's broadest line of high-performance servers. The company's solutions are ``Built for Fast Times(tm),' enabling customers to exploit the value of information technology for success in the Internet economy. These solutions reflect Hitachi's vision of allowing clients to focus on their business, and not their technology. Hitachi Data Systems is owned by Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE:HIT - news) and has its headquarters in Santa Clara, California. For further information on Hitachi Data Systems, access www.hds.com.
About Hitachi, Ltd.
Hitachi, Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, is one of the world's leading global electronics companies, with fiscal 1998 (ended March 31, 1999) consolidated sales of 7,977 billion yen ($65.9 billion(1)). The company manufactures and markets a wide range of products, including computers, semiconductors, consumer products and power and industrial equipment. For more information on Hitachi, Ltd., please visit Hitachi's Web site at hitachi.co.jp.
(1) At an exchange rate of 121 yen to the dollar.
Hitachi Data Systems is registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a trademark and service mark of Hitachi, Ltd. Freedom Storage, NanoCopy, and FlashAccess are trademarks of Hitachi Data Systems Corporation. ``Built for Fast Times' is a trademark of Hitachi America, Ltd. UNIX is a trademark in the United States and other countries, licensed exclusively through X/Open Company, Limited. Linux is a trademark of Linus Torvalds. Red Hat is a registered trademark of Red Hat, Incorporated. OS/390 and S/390 are registered trademarks and Geographically Dispersed Parallel Sysplex and GDPS are trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation. NetWare is a registered trademark of Novell, Inc. Windows NT and Windows 2000 are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.
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