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VMware’s parent company, EMC, generally moves out of the spotlight during the VMworld conference each year, although it is always sure to make a statement or two.
The statement this time is that the world’s largest data storage and protection company announced new support Aug. 30 for VMware View 5.0 for its VNX unified storage system, which is the designated replacement for EMC’s rather elderly Clariion and Celerra midrange storage systems.
The VNX product line, which includes both the VNX and VNXe (capacities are different), is aimed at midrange business systems yet supports VMware View deployments of any size and scale, ranging from hundreds to thousands of desktops, EMC said.
The entry-level VNX and VNXe storage systems feature a starting price of about $10,000, EMC Vice President of Marketing Shane Jackson told eWEEK. Jackson said the machines can be configured in a few minutes using a wizard interface to provision email boxes and storage allotments, storage targets, access controls and other policies for up to hundreds of email users.
EMC also claims that no advanced IT experience is necessary to install, provision and maintain this system.
The current Clariion CX4 series, Celerra NS integrated platforms (including the Clariion CX4 and Celerra High Density Rack systems) and associated models will go end-of-life (EOL) on Dec. 31, 2011, an EMC spokesperson told eWEEK.
EMC said it will continue to offer previous-generation (including CX4 and NS) upgrades/in-family conversions, including Fibre Channel disk, I/O and software upgrades, for at least another 18 months past the EOL date. Service and support will then continue for five years until the end-of-service-life date of Dec. 31, 2016.
The VNX line with VMware View 5.0 features:
- Boosted performance during log-in storms. Early test results have shown the ability to boot 500 VMware View 5.0 desktops on VMware vSphere 5.0 over NFS to steady state in 5 minutes.
- Maximum efficiency by using the EMC FAST Suite to deliver high performance and capacity efficiency for VMware View 5. EMC FAST Cache allows customers to reduce the number of drives used in a View environment while providing fast boot time performance.
- Simplified management by deploying VMware View 5.0 with confidence whether in NFS or Fibre Channel environments.