SAN JOSE, Calif.: NETGEAR, Inc., a provider of networking solutions, on Wednesday announced that its ReadyNAS family of unified network storage devices for the Small- to Medium-sized Business (SMB) market are certified as compatible with VMware's ESX 4.0 virtualization solution.

With this announcement, NETGEAR's ReadyNAS storage products can be fully integrated with VMware, providing SMBs with the benefits of virtualization at an affordable price point.
 
As a result, NETGEAR channel partners can now deliver virtualization solutions to SMBs for as little as $1,000 in a desktop form factor, said a press release.

"Server virtualization is traditionally the domain of the datacenter. NETGEAR ReadyNAS systems can now bring cost savings and availability to SMBs with newly affordable solutions. NETGEAR is committed to staying at the leading edge of feature functionality for SMBs, so our choice to integrate with VMware was an easy one." said Drew Meyer, director of marketing for NETGEAR's Network Storage Business Unit.

NETGEAR's entire ReadyNAS product line, from the desktop ReadyNAS Pro and ReadyNAS NVX, to the rack-mountable ReadyNAS 2100 and 3200, can take advantage of this new certification using the Network File System (NFS) protocol.

Now, SMBs can reduce their server and storage costs while simplifying infrastructure management and flexibility.

SMBs seeking first-time virtualization can cost-effectively implement a certified ReadyNAS with VMware solution and eliminate dedicated file servers, while current ReadyNAS users can easily deploy a VMware solution without purchasing additional storage capacity and partners can use ReadyNAS to deliver a powerful and still affordable unified storage solution, added the release.