STORAGE: What's in Store?

Merger Mania



We've

had a $13 bn merger between Symantec and Veritas. McData just gobbled up CNT,

and EMC's acquisitions will soon surpass the number of McDonalds franchises in

North America. Look for more mergers in 2005. Lots more, and lots of big ones

too.

Virtue in

Virtualization?



While

virtualization has been a buzz word for years, the signs are that some vendors

are getting closer. Though the actuality is unlikely to match the hype, major

players like EMC, IBM and Hitachi are working hard on virtualization

technology. In addition, upstarts like Katana (or VirtuOS Computing as it plans

to rename itself) are keeping very hush-hush about virtual multiprocessor

technology using inexpensive PCs.

Gateway to

Heaven?



NAS

gateways represented a major market shift in 2004. And they will continue to

this year. EMC gained significant market share last year due to its support of

NAS gateway initiatives. It offers Celerra running in front of Symmetrix as a

NAS gateway option, while NetApp offers a gateway to HDS and HP systems.

Newcomers like OnStor and Acopie also offer interesting NAS gateway products.

Less Fuzzy

iSCSI



The

battle between Fibre Channel and iSCSI is on! iSCSI not only has low cost on

its side. It is also catching up fast in terms of performance. Expect iSCSI to

carve a larger slice of the pie and FC vendors to strike back with slashed

costs. Either way, users win.

Comply or

Die



With

some deadlines past and others looming, compliance is high on the storage

agenda for 2005. Enterprise Strategy Group predicts that the total volume of

compliant records worldwide will increase from 376 petabytes in 2003 to 1,644

petabytes by 2006.

ILM Hype



Faster

than a speeding disk drive; more powerful than a POWER5 processor; able to leap

tall Symmetrix boxes in a single bound. Is it a bird, is it a plane, no-it's

I—L—M! Information Lifecycle Management. Like it or loathe it, no vendor can

afford to ignore ILM. Unlike 2004, actual products may even arrive on the

market showing early-day ILM features.

Switching

the Switches



4-Gbps

switching has arrived. Brocade and HP are first to market. IBM isn't far

behind. By the end of the year, every storage and r switch vendor will be

delivering 4-Gbps gear.

Tiny Disk Drive



We've had 3.5-inch drives for a while now, so its time for a change.

Look for 2.5-inch drives tobecome more available in rack-mounted and

server-blade systems.

Long Live

the Tape



Yes.

They've been saying it for years. Tape is finally dead. And what takes over? A

better kind of tape. LTO3 tape systems from the likes of HP, IBM and Quantum

can now be purchased, thereby doubling the capacity of tape to 400 GB

uncompressed, and increasing the data transfer rate to 80 MBps.

Power to the

User



While

2004 was the year that the ASNP boosted its membership numbers, 2005 will see

the return of user power in an industry that sorely needs it. Look for many

exciting programs to emerge this year that will give you more say on how

vendors produce products.

Source : Robb Dennis, Association of Storage Networking

Professionals

Dataquest