Enterprise Storage
Agere Core Handles Serial Storage Interfaces
Agere Systems announced a configurable physical-layer core that can handle three serial storage interfaces. The serializer/deserializer block will support Serial ATA (SATA), Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) or Fibre Channel interfaces for disk drives and host bus controllers when it becomes available in April. By providing a single interface core to verify and characterize, Agere aims to cut the design time for hard disk and server makers to support multiple new interfaces. Today makers of hard disk and host bus controllers use separate parallel ATA, SCSI and Fibre Channel physical layer devices.
Read the full story on:EE Times
Personal Storage
DVD+RW Group Gets Microsoft Backing
The DVD+RW Alliance this week announced that Microsoft is its latest member, and will join the Alliances Executive and Steering Committee. Microsoft previously committed to supporting the DVD+R and DVD+RW rewriteable DVD format in Longhorn, the next Windows version, at last Aprils WinHEC 2002 trade show, but company executives at the time said that Microsoft would also support other recordable DVD formats, including DVD-R and DVD-RW.
Read the full story on: WinInfo
Storage Business
Maxtor Taps Tufano as CEO
Maxtor this week named Paul Tufano as president and chief executive officer. Tufano, 49, also will join Maxtors board as a director, the company said. Tufano was previously acting president and chief executive. He succeeds Michael Cannon, who resigned in January to become chief executive of Solectron, a contract electronics manufacturer.
Read the full story on:Computer Reseller News
Storage Network Switches Saw Sales Spurt
Worldwide sales of SAN switches grew 15 percent year-over-year to $954 million in 2002 — and will hit $1.1 billion this year, according to a report published this week by the DellOro Group. The major driver of growth last year appears to be the transition from 1-Gbit/s to 2-Gbit/s Fibre Channel switches. The study revealed that 2-Gbit/s FC switches accounted for more than 95 percent of fourth-quarter 2002 sales, versus less than 20 percent in the same quarter in 2001.
Read the full story on: Byte and Switch