EMC Revamps Its DMX Disk Arrays

EMC Corp. is expected to announce improvements to its high-end Symmetrix DMX disk arrays, providing customers with doubled cache, increased capacity and the ability to combine Fibre Channel and Serial ATA drives in the same box, sources said.

Revamping its DMX line for the first time in nearly two years, the new DMX models, internally known as Symmetrix 7, will boast double the global memory cache, from 256GB to 512GB; add up to 33 percent more capacity via the addition of a 400GB Serial ATA drive; and add 4G-bit Fibre Channel connectivity.

Other features include a 4GB front end and a back end that is 4GB-capable—although no drives are said to be available yet; increased capacity via support for 146GB, 15,000-rpm drives; and several new clustering capabilities.

The newest model in EMCs Symmetrix family, DMX was unveiled more than two years ago.

The product provides a set of local-copy and remote-copy functions to reduce transaction times, boost throughput and improve application performance for IT operations, most notably disaster recovery.

Current Symmetrix DMX models include the entry-level DMX800, as well as the larger 1000, 2000 and 3000 models.

Jack Yudell, data center operations manager for the Austin Radiological Association, in Texas, is running EMCs Symmetrix DMX1000 as his primary storage head.

Although he said he probably wont move to Symmetrix 7 for at least a year for cost reasons, Yudell said he is impressed with EMCs asynchronous SRDF (Symmetrix Remote Data Facility) and snapshot upgrades in the product.

/zimages/6/28571.gifClick hereto read more about EMCs Symmetrix DMX products.

“The biggest things the new architecture has is dual bus [adapters] and the ability to use snapshots, which was supported with DMX and the SRDF/A” improvements, he said. “Those were the biggest carrots they were dangling.”

Yudell added, “Ive been told the [Symmetrix] 7 is out and have been given a brief overview. But its way too soon to be able to pass that cost through upper management.”

Welcome to the family

The new DMX joins existing models

• DMX800 8 to 120 drives for a capacity of up to 17.5TB
• DMX1000-single bay 64 to 144 drives for a maximum capacity of 21TB
• DMX2000-dual bay 128 to 288 drives for a max capacity of 42TB
• DMX3000-triple bay 289 to 576 drives for a max capacity of over 84TB

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