IBM DS4700 vs CX3-10

[jpedrocarvalho]

Hi,

Can anyone help me choosing one of these 2 SAN. They are beeing proposed at the same price.

CX3-10: 15x146GB FC4

DS4700: 10x300GB FC4

Thanks

[ZMkenzie]

More disks = more performance, so i would go for the CX3 expecially because vmware stress a lot the disks.

[jpedrocarvalho]

I can get the IBM with the same disk config.

I would like to compare the SAN in terms of performance, customer satisfaction, support.

\- Dell told me that their SAN uses PCIE bus (faster) than the IBM that still uses PCIX? Is this correct?

\- IBM's support is direct and from partners, while DELL's is done directly with them. Any feed back on support? Any complaints?

[boydd]

IBM support is much better than Dells. DS uses second gen PCIX which has the same perf as the CX. I use both. If pricing is similar - go with IBM.

My $0.02

DB

[CXSANGUY]

Go with the CX3-10

[mbruss1000]

We purchased the CX3-10 and have been very happy with it. We decided on that over the EqualLogic box because it can do both iSCSI and FC. We also decided to go with the direct EMC support instead of going with the Dell support. You do have that option... We have the same config that you are considering and use both the iSCSI and the FC and have been very happy with the perfomance.

Mike

[CXSANGUY]

You don't have the option of going direct EMC in all parts of the world. I definitely strongely agree that direct EMC is better where available, but would still choose Dell over others if I had no choice.

Particularly, in that case, Dell should be sweetening the deal by giving rock-bottom server pricing as part of the purchase etc.

[lljfox]

EMC product, and more disk more perf.

[mreferre]

Dell told me that their SAN uses PCIE bus (faster) than the IBM that still

>uses PCIX? Is this correct?

I don't want to usually get into these discussions as I am not interested in the community to think I am pushing IBM for granted ....

But this statement is well over the standards ......

I am not even sure what they are saying as it is my understanding that we have a PCI-express card available (and most servers now ship with PCI-e slots)..... but the point is that these buses are now capable of reaching such a huge amount of bandwidth that they would most likely NEVER be a bottleneck anyway ..... especially if you consider a VMware environment where you would not want to run HUGE I/O intensive workloads....and even if you wanted you would NOT get to those limits in the hundreds of MB/sec .........

It's like saying two SAS hard disk drives are faster than 2 SCSI hard disk drives because SAS is a 600MB/sec technology, while SCSI is a 320MB/sec technology (try to push your car to the speed limit on an empty 3 lanes highway ....... and try it again on an empty 32 lanes highway ..... if you notice any difference let me know because than Dell would be right).

Next they will tell you that the CX is faster because is white Vs black or something similar ........

Go with the CX and I am sure it will be fine as it is rock solid as far as I have heard ....... but don't let them fool you .... please.

Massimo.

[jpedrocarvalho]

I don't want to usually get into these discussions as

I am not interested in the community to think I am

pushing IBM for granted ....

But that's what I want. By your e-mail I guess you know the DS4700 very well. So you can speak of it eaven if your pulling things a bit that way. Someone will came after and defend the CX3-10.

I can even tell more about the global solution:

IBM

2 x (X3650 - 2xQuad Core - 16GB Ram - Dual Port NIC)

DS4700 - 10x300GB FC4

2 x Brocade

1 x Autoloader

Vmware VI3 + VC Enterprise (3 years sub)

DELL - EMC Local

2 x (2900 - 2xQuad Core - 16GB Ram - 2xDual port NIC)

CX3-10 - 15x146GB

2 x Brocade

1 x Autoloader

3 Year warranty - GOLD Support

3 Year ECM support

Vmware VI3 + VC Enterprise (3 years sub)

DELL - FULL DELL

2 x (2900 - 2xQuad Core - 16GB Ram - 2xDual port NIC)

CX3-10 - 10x300GB

2 x Brocade

1 x Autoloader

3 Year warranty - GOLD Suport

Vmware VI3 + VC Enterprise (3 years sub)

We are going to virtualiza the folowing servers:

\- AD

\- SQL

\- Exchange

\- Exchange EDGE

\- ISA

\- Blackberry

\- Web

Thanks

[mreferre]

>By your e-mail I guess you know the DS4700 very well. So you can speak

>of it eaven if your pulling things a bit that way

Actually:

1) I don't know the 4700 very well

2) I don't want to pull things a bit that way (that's what your sales rep do).

Massimo.

[sipsipi]

Here is my config:

DS4700 v 70 (less Cache than the 72)

16x300GB FC Drives - 10k --- they now have 300GB 15k's

2 Brocade FC Switches

9xHPDL380 G5's, 2 dual core and 16 GB RAM Each

\------

I am particularly happy, very happy with what I have.

THE Only reason I didn't go with EMC is that here in Chicago, the sales guys are vultures. They have serious quotas they have to reach, and I am not hugely fond of them. The technology as far as I am concerned is SANs is almost at the point that there is so little difference between the box'o'disks, that I cannot justify the difference between them. The big deal I see is that IBM, although a large behemoth of a company, they really want to be in the storage world more and more, and you might find a rep with good deals -- really good deals.

Basically though, as I said -- They are all just boxes'o'disks.

[jpedrocarvalho]

Sipsipi,

Thank you, your feedback realy helps.

Massimo,

I hope I didn't offend you. I'm only trying to get some help. You talked about the DS4700 bus tecnology, so I thought you knew it.

[mreferre]

No offense at all.

Actually I was talking about a general discussion of bus bandwidth .... not DS4700 specific ......

Massimo.

[christianZ]

IMHO the counterpart to DS4700 should be the CX30-20 (or higher) not CX30-10 (CX entry model).

By DS4700 you get the new 4Gb FC disks - do you get the same with CX ?

I would go with DS4700.

[jpedrocarvalho]

Yes, the DS4700 comes with 300GB 15K FC4 disks.

\- FULL DELL comes also with 300GB 15K FC4 disks.

\- DELL with EMC Local comes with 146GB 15K FC4 disks, because EMC doesn't sell the 300GB yet.

[christianZ]

IMHO the counterpart to DS4700 should be the CX30-20

(or higher) not CX30-10 (CX entry model).

Ok, the disks are the same.

I would be interested in others opinions to my statement above.

... and don't forget, you can award the points for "helpful" or "correct" answers here!

[CoreyIT]

Yes Christian,

The cx310 and up come with 4gb/s fc drives.

[jpedrocarvalho]

Yes they all come with the FC4 disks.

What I would like confirmed is if the DS4700 is at the level of the CX3-10 or the CX3-20.

Thanks

[sipsipi]

When you say "At the level" I am not sure what you are saying.

But, like I said before, I really don't think you will see much difference in either one. The price and support are the only things I would be really that concerned about during the purchase, and the configuration you create when you install the servers, and SAN (RAID, LUNS, etc).