A number of vendors recently began shipping RAID arrays for SMBs, with some targeting the ‘S’ in SMB.
Data Robotics introduced the newest member in its Drobo line of RAID arrays. The DroboPro FS (file sharing) is an eight-drive NAS appliance that can be configured with 2TB SATA drives. Users can mix and match drive speeds (rotation rates) and manufacturers.
One key addition in the DroboPro FS is Drobo Sync, which provides asynchronous, block-level replication for uni-directional offsite backup. Only changed data is sent over the wire.
DroboPro FS, which is based on Data Robotics’ BeyondRAID and Auto-Thinning (thin provisioning) technologies, comes with two Gigabit Ethernet ports.
Pricing starts at $1,999 for a diskless configuration. An 8TB configuration is priced at $2,699, and a 16TB version is priced at $3,299, including all software.
Related article: “Data Robotics adds file sharing to Drobo arrays”
Dot Hill, which sells through the channel, began shipping the AssuredSAN 3400 Series of RAID arrays this month, which are targeted at SMBs. Most notably, the AssuredSAN 3420 (up to 24 2.5-inch drives) and 3430 (up to 12 3.5-inch drives) come with 10Gbps iSCSI/Ethernet interfaces.
The 3400 series arrays are available with Dot Hill’s optional AssuredSnap (up to 1,000 snapshots) and AssuredCopy (up to 128 volume copies) data protection software, and can be configured with a mix of SAS, SATA and solid-state disk (SSD) drives. “Green” features include drive spin down and the company’s battery-free EcoStor alternative for cache, which combines super capacitors and flash memory.
Starting price for a disk-less 2U array with dual controllers is $18,970. Users can add up to seven JBOD enclosures for a maximum of 144 2.5-inch drives.
With an eye on the media and surveillance markets, Infortrend recently launched a new member in its EonStor DS family of disk arrays. The latest addition has 6Gbps SAS connections for disk drives and hosts. The company claims performance of 2,500MBps on reads and 1,100MBps on writes. Via external enclosures, the EonStor DS arrays can scale up to 224TB.
MicroNet Technology this week began shipping the RAIDBank 5 disk array, which scales to 10TB and includes AES-256 encryption, a USB 3.0 interface, and performance of more than 200MBps. In addition to USB 3.0, the arrays are available with FireWire 400, FireWire 800 and 300MBps eSATA interfaces.
An entry-level, 2.5TB configuration is priced at $799, while a 10TB configuration is priced at $1,799.
