IBM unveils faster midrange storage array

New IBM DS5020 Express system offers 8Gbit/sec Fibre Channel connectivity

IBM today announced that its latest midrange storage array, the IBM System Storage DS5020 Express, will be available on Sept. 4.

The DS5020 Express supports all current IBM premium features, including partitioning, FlashCopy for point-in-time copies of logical volumes or data sets, VolumeCopy for data migration between arrays and enhanced remote mirroring for disaster recovery and business continuity applications, providing enterprise-class storage capabilities to for mid-sized organizations, IBM said.

The company said the new offering is targeted at mid-size companies in the the retail, health care, insurance, manufacturing and other industries along with government agencies dealing with the need to securely analyze analyzing an ever-increasing flow of data.

The System Storage DS5020 Express array comes with four 8Gbit/sec Fibre Channel ports along with four additional ports that can be either Fibre Channel or 1Gbit/sec iSCSI, and supports up to 112 drives with EXP520 expansion units.

Drive options include high-end Fibre Channel disk, self-encrypting Fibre Channel drives, and higher-capacity, lower performance serial ATA drives.

IBM said that capacity can be added to the new storage array with no downtime to applications.

The system also supports a variety of virtualization technologies, including IBM's PowerVM, Microsoft's 2008 Hyper-V and vSphere 4 from VMware.

"Mid-sized businesses are no different than their larger counterparts, as they are facing relentless data growth and shrinking budgets, which is why they're seeking storage solutions that will help reduce costs through efficiencies," Bob Cancilla, IBM's vice president, disk systems, said in a statement.

"The IBM System Storage DS5020 Express addresses those needs, while its full-disk encryption also makes it ideal for hosting business-critical applications."

The System Storage DS5020 Express, along with IBM service support and a three-year warranty, is priced from $US22,500.

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