DataDirect Networks Targets Big Data With New Appliances

Data storage specialist DataDirect Networks has become the latest vendor to cater for ‘big data’ after it released the DDN SFA10K-M and SFA10K-ME big data appliances.

The SFA10K-ME features DDN’s In-Storage Processing technology and is built with high-speed server virtualisation technology to co-locate big data applications closest to data and eliminate the need for storage processing and networking.

As a high-speed block storage appliance, the SFA10K-M, featuring InfiniBand or Fibre Channel connection, can be configured to deliver up to 10GB per second in only 20U and supports up to 720TB of capacity and can be scaled out with any of DDN’s file storage offerings as a modular big data building block.

In addition, the SFA10K-ME configurations, featuring InfiniBand or Ethernet connection, can be configured to support DDN’s GridScaler and ExaScaler parallel file system software to scale file system performance beyond 1TB per second and volume capacity beyond 10 petabytes.

The company’s two systems are available both through DDN’s sales force and the company’s global partner network.

Smaller Form Factor

With a reduced configuration, the system features up to 40 percent lower entry pricing and 57 percent smaller form factor than previous SFA10K configurations. To support the product introduction, DDN is announcing a three-month introductory price for the SFA10K-M, which starts at $100,000 (£63,000).

“The ‘big’ in ‘big data’ is a relative term, like the ‘high’ in ‘high-performance computing.’

Big data is about the growth in data across multiple industries, causing organisations to address high-performance data management issues they haven’t had to cope with before,” said Addison Snell, CEO of IT analytics group Intersect360 Research. “Not every big data problem is in petabytes. That’s why it makes sense for DDN to extend its high-performance storage lines into the midrange, to lower the entry point for big data management.”

During the three-month promotional period between 1 April, 2012, and 30 June, 2012, DDN will offer 10K-M pricing, starting at $100,000. The promotional $100,000 entry-level configuration consists of one SFA10K-M storage array bundle with eight InfiniBand ports, one 60-slot 4U SS7000 enclosure, 6G bit cables, 16GB of mirrored cache, battery, operating system (OS) Licenses for four Raid Processors including SATAssure, RAID levels 1, 5 and 6. Installation, annual support and ExaScaler or GridScaler add-on software is sold separately.

“One of the key attributes of today’s big data is the lack of predictability of data growth across customer environments,” said Alex Bouzari, CEO of DDN. “Today’s announcement of our SFA10K-M and SFA10K-ME platforms is an important step in furthering the democratisation of big data and enabling our customers to resolve big data unpredictability by starting small and growing incrementally into massively scalable big data technology.”