In addition to announcing their DR4000 disk backup appliance Dell also announced an update to Compellent’s Storage Center software that controls their storage systems. In large part this is an under the covers upgrade as the product moves from a 32-bit operating environment to a 64-bit environment but there are also some important enhancements in terms of supporting virtual server infrastructures.

While Storage Switzerland will get into the details of the importance of moving Storage Center to a 64-bit operating environment in a future article, the key takeaways are; significant improvements in memory capacity as well as substantial performance gains which will come next in the SC8000. The upgrade should also deliver a better total cost of ownership due to capability gains like higher disk densities, better power and cooling and other quality enhancements.

On the outside, Compellent Storage Center 6.0 delivers another progression of VMware integration improvements. Compellent has further taken advantage of the VMware vSphere vStorage API for Array Integration (VAAI). Dell Compellent VMware vSphere™ Storage APIs for Array Integration offers full copy offload and hardware-assisted locking features that extend Compellent’s existing support for block zeroing. These features speed deployment of virtual machines up to 40 percent faster, free up network and hosting resources and can improve storage performance for data volumes shared by multiple virtual machines.

Storage Center 6.0 also includes improved support for Site Recovery Manager version 5 by taking advantage of the storage replication adapter which allows for automated fail-back, as well as new workflows for planned migration and downtime. Compellent continues a support relationship with VMware for SRM allowing all DR hardware and software support to be provided by Compellent’s Co-pilot support center.

Finally Compellent upgraded their vCenter plug-in to integrate with the vSphere 5 Enterprise Manager software suite. This allows Compellent virtualized storage resources to be managed from the vSphere 5 client including the ability to provision, expand, replicate and configure storage. This further simplifies both the server manager’s job as well as the storage manager’s job.

Storage Swiss take

While most of the headlines of Storage Center 6.0 are beneath the covers the capabilities of a completely 64-bit storage operating environment will greatly enhance Compellent’s ability to scale both performance and capacity. This is a critical step and allows them to move beyond a large business storage solution and truly begin making claims for the enterprise storage environment. With 6.0, Compellent should be able to compete toe to toe with the so-called “big boys” of the storage industry.

Dell is a client of Storage Switzerland

 

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