Verari, Xsigo Offer Virtual I/O

Verari Systems and Xsigo Systems are teaming up to offer virtual I/O within blade servers.

Verari, known for its dense blade platforms and storage platforms, is now integrating Xsigo’s VP780 I/O Director within its BladeRack 2X-Series blade systems.

The world of virtual I/O is one part of the entire virtualization wave that has received little attention, although it will become an increasingly important part of building out a virtual infrastructure as IT departments look to offer better ways to manage virtual machines.

Xsigo is looking to cash in on what it believes is an important trend in virtualization. In September 2007, the company introduced the VP780 I/O Director, which used specialized processors and Infiniband connectivity to create a virtual way to allow data to flow through a system. The technology allows for less cabling and replaces multiple physical and network and storage interfaces, such as network interface cards and host bus adapters, with virtual resources that appears to the rest of the platform as physical hardware.

The benefit for users is a dense blade platform that removes some of the physical limitations of connected hardware to storage. The Verari blade offers up to 32 storage connections and 64 networks connection per blade.

By using virtual I/O, which can all be managed through a single console, IT administrators can provision new resources without touching any physical part of the data center. This is the type of technology needed for businesses that have remote data centers that are far removed from headquarters. The ability to change the I/O on the fly also eliminates bottlenecks when it comes to performance.

Verari is now selling its BladeRack 2X-Series system with the integrated Xsigo Director. The companies did not disclose price.