Recommendation for $50,000-$65,000 SAN

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TruthSeeker

Limp Gawd
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I need some recommendations for which SAN will offer my company the best bang for the buck.

I currently have Dell hardware consisting of 8 servers and ~15TB of drive arrays. I have ~200 users with only about 30 users using huge image files for work.

Thanks for all replies!
 
If you want iSCSI

I really like the Dell EqualLogic

I think those are really cool, and it comes with all the software you will need. The price you see is the price you pay.

Some stuff you have to pay *extra to get certain features. This is a complete package.
Plus its really easy to expand. If you need more space you buy another unit, hook it up. Its recognized and it automatically restripes/ expands the array across both modules.
 
nitrobass24 said:
I really like the Dell EqualLogic

I think those are really cool, and it comes with all the software you will need. The price you see is the price you pay.
Click to expand...
+1 for the EqualLogic.
PS5000 series. Only potential downside depending on how much of a stickler you are for those things is that you can not create arrays on the controller level, meaning if you have a 16-bay SAN, you can't create 3x5-disk arrays and a hotspare. The controller will bunch all of your drives into one big array that you can then carve your LUNs out of.

However, simple fact that there are no hidden charges is what makes it worth buying.
 
What's the application? Are you booting off the SAN? iSCSI or FC? Do you have an existing FC infrastructure? Looking for dumb storage or do you need snapshot, replication, etc...?
 
I'll throw in a recommendation for Netapp, the built in snapshot capability is really nice and they are quite price competitive in that price range for iSCSI.
 
second for netapp, look at a 2050. we just picked one up for some "scratch space" mostly database snap mirroring for some of our devs. more competitive than we thought they would be. looked at EMC, and SUN's new stuff, also looked at Dell equilogic, and while they did buy us steak and pick up the tab for the drinks, dell wasn't able to sway us, LOL.

however, if you need a lot of the features not offered at a basic license level with the netapp array, the Dell might actually be good, as you only pay for the hardware, all software features are included. we're presently being raped $1000 per HBA for MPIO licensing (netapp monsy grab for this months budget? haha) :mad:
 
Thuleman said:
+1 for the EqualLogic.
PS5000 series. Only potential downside depending on how much of a stickler you are for those things is that you can not create arrays on the controller level, meaning if you have a 16-bay SAN, you can't create 3x5-disk arrays and a hotspare. The controller will bunch all of your drives into one big array that you can then carve your LUNs out of.

However, simple fact that there are no hidden charges is what makes it worth buying.
Click to expand...

+2 for Dell Equallogic.

For me I find that very appealing as it simplifies things, and you don't have to worry about how you're going to setup your drives.

Their interface is pretty good, the only thing is it's pretty comparing to other same class systems, but that's because it includes everything (even DR capabilities if you buy more than one). Plus performance is pretty much linear when you add arrays, 12 being the limit per group.

If you want more bang for the buck then I would suggest maxing out a Dell MD3000i with MD1000s attached to it. You could also get a PV NX1950 which is basically WUDSS using an MD3000 as it's backend storage. The only problem with these setups is that it's limited to 45TB of raw data (45x1TB drives/) Of course that is unless Dell starts packing them with 2TB drives.
 
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