‘Industry-first’ for ultra density storage arrays

The industry-first Dot Hill ultra-density chassis houses nearly 58 terabytes of data on small form factor 2.5-inch hard disk drives (HDD), while utilising 23% less power in an efficient 2U footprint. For high performance transaction workloads, the array can support any combination of solid state drives (SSD) and HDD drives in the same enclosure. This footprint also reduces weight by 25%, which is critical in crowded data centre environments. Multiple OEM customers are already engaged with active evaluations and all Ultra48 configurations will be generally available this quarter for all OEM and channel partners.

“While other vendors currently offer ‘cheap-and-deep’ high-density products based on high-capacity 3.5-inch drives, our unique, ultra-density chassis offers twice the performance and twice the capacity per rack unit compared to traditional chassis for unprecedented throughput and transaction performance and efficiency,” explained Jim Jonez, senior director of marketing, Dot Hill. “The Ultra48 AssuredSAN storage solutions are designed specifically for high-performance throughput applications, delivering up to 6400 MB/s sustained reads and 5300 MB/s writes in a single enclosure; this configuration delivers more performance across a range of vertical markets and traditional data centre environments. In doing so, Dot Hill effectively doubles the throughput performance achievable in a data centre cabinet.”

Developed with mission critical applications and data centre efficiency in mind, the Ultra48 chassis is uniquely designed with three removable drawers that each hold sixteen 2.5-inch HDDs or SSDs. Dot Hill has six patent applications in process for this new architecture, which incorporates fully redundant and hot swappable components and provides easy serviceability resulting in lower support costs through the life of the product. Each drawer can open while the system remains active, allowing easy access to replace failed drives. Further, drawers are designed for warm swap replacement as needed for service. The Ultra48 is also backed by a best-in-class 37 month “bumper to bumper” warranty that covers all hardware components including interface transceivers.

Ultra48 storage solutions are available with the latest, high-bandwidth interfaces for advanced infrastructures, including:
· Ultra48 AssuredSAN 16Gb Fibre Channel or 10Gb iSCSI model based on dual-personality adapter technology;
· Ultra48 AssuredSAN 12Gb SAS model; and,
· Ultra48 AssuredSAN Expansion array or JBOD.

“The Ultra48 storage solutions are the latest example of how Dot Hill evolves storage through continued innovation,” said Brian Garrett, vice president, ESG Lab. “Dot Hill is the first company to pack forty-eight 2.5-inch HDD or SDD drives into a highly modular 2U form factor, Dot Hill has raised the bar for high-density storage solutions. The combination of high-density storage running the highest bandwidth interfaces --16Gb Fibre Channel, 10Gb iSCSI and 12Gb SAS --provides a truly compelling offering that sets Dot Hill apart from other players.”

“The Ultra48 design was created with specific input from several of our OEM customers,” said Garrett Wein, vice president of OEM sales, Dot Hill. “This will enable Dot Hill to fill a need for improved price/performance in demanding throughput-intensive applications with a differentiated product to enable OEM customers to grow their business.”

“Dot Hill Ultra48 AssuredSAN high-density storage arrays provide our channel partners with highly compelling storage solutions that no one but Dot Hill is delivering,” said Brad Painter, vice president of channel sales, Dot Hill. “Our customers require a highly flexible, scalable storage platform that is tuned for today’s big data and analytics environments. Vertical markets such as media & entertainment, oil & gas, Big Data analytics and cloud services run throughput intensive applications that benefit significantly from the high sequential performance of the new Ultra48 models.”

“We are seeing interest in high density storage systems that can perform at the levels needed for 4K, High Frame Rate, and 3D workflows. Media and entertainment professionals in particular are looking for reliable storage solutions that excel at streaming throughput,” said Jason Beeson, solutions director at European storage distributor Hammer. “Supercomputing and data centre professionals that require the highest levels of storage performance in a small footprint will also benefit from the unique design of Dot Hill’s chassis configuration. We are sure to see great demand for such high performance and efficiency in one solution which is perfectly suited to key vertical markets.”

Performance, Data Availability and Compatibility that Dot Hill Customers Expect and Demand
Dot Hill Ultra48 AssuredSAN models deliver new breakthrough storage solution capabilities that are built on the company’s latest-generation RAID stack. The Ultra48 models support all of Dot Hill’s data management software technologies comprised of AssuredSnap™ for point-in-time snapshots, AssuredCopy™ for creating volume copies, and AssuredRemote™ for array-based remote replication, as well as the company’s RAIDar management interface. Support for popular storage software platforms such as VMware vSphere, Microsoft Hyper-V, Citrix XenServer and Veeam Backup & Replication are expected.

Ultra48 AssuredSAN 12Gb SAS storage solutions offer the highest SAS bandwidth available. Ultra48 AssuredSAN 4844 solutions provide the flexibility to run 16Gb Fibre Channel, 8Gb Fibre Channel, 4Gb Fibre Channel, 10Gb iSCSI and 1Gb iSCSI networks using the same hardware. With a quick swap of a transceiver module, IT administrators can configure their storage in the field to 16Gb Fibre Channel or 10Gb iSCSI. The converged interface includes a four-port controller that can be configured with four Fibre Channel ports, four iSCSI ports, or a combination of both Fibre Channel and iSCSI ports.

The high-density models support over 230 terabytes in a mere eight rack units, saving critical data centre floor space. The high-density configurations can be combined with other AssuredSAN 4004 2U12 and 2U24 chassis as a RAID head or JBOD for flexible expansion options.

Data Security Through Full Disk Encryption
The Dot Hill platform also includes support for HGST and Seagate® Full Disk Encryption (FDE). Self-encrypting drives encrypt every write operation and decrypt every read operation without user intervention. With drive-level protection of data, FDE drives remain fully protected with an encryption key. FDE support is expected to be available in the first quarter of 2014.