iscsi SAN redundancy query

[mcwill]

As we put more applications under ESX I'm conscious that our current SAN (sanmelody) is a single point of failure. Yes it has drives in RAID, redundant power supplies and redundant network connections however there are still several single points of failure in the system.

One option is to setup a sanmelody mirror based around 2 identical Dell PE1950 + MD1000 unit loaded with SATA drives - cost approx £15k

It has been suggested we also consider a single EQL PS100E, this would have a couple of benefits

a) 2 power supplies to feed instead of 8 = less stress on UPS

b) All software/feature options are included in the PS100E

I do have a few questions though...

1) Is a single PS100E unit fully redundant or do we need a pair (cost = way over budget) for full redundancy?

2) I understand in the US that the PS100E can be had for close to $30K, does this mean a UK street price would be close to £17K? Or does the $1=£1 exchange rate apply.

3) With redundancy & performance as primary requirements, is there anything else sub £20K that we should be looking at?

Thanks for any help

[femialpha]

The PS100E is fully redundant. It is also very scalable so if you need to expand storage or upgrade in future, it can be done with not disruption to production. There might be some UK based users who can give you an idea of what is costs over there or better still, call your local vendor. If you are hard pressed for cash, take a look at the Dell/EMC AX150i. If is fully redundant too but does not have the performance of he Equallogic. I guess you get what you pay for. I bought 2 Ax150i in the UK (i'm in the US but support a datacenter in London too) for about 7 or 8K (can't remember exact cost) and i use backups, file server, small sql server and about 20 very low utilization virtual machines.

[mcwill]

Thanks for the response, reading these forums I don't think the Ax150i will give us any better performance over our existing box. Obviously the pair would be mirrored but it's probably a dead end solution.

The PS100E appeals due to 100% positive feedback on these forums. As for calling our vendor for pricing - at the moment we don't have one, this would be our first purchase of this type. (uk vendor recommendations would be good too).

[christianZ]

I would recommend to get a demo box first - that shouldn't be any problem in UK, I think.

[woharrow]

email paul sudlow psudlow@equallogic.com he is out of our UK office. tell him wade gave you his email....... paul can set you up with the right people.

thanks

wade

[mcwill]

Just to complete the thread, an order went in for a PS100E today.

Equallogic came out, connected up to our ESX server then happily pulled out components including the controller card whilst the ESX server was connected to the array. Very impressive.

[woharrow]

thank you ! Glad to hear you are going to join the many happy VMWare & EqualLogic Customers!

Welcome aboard!

Wade