"In the last five years, applications running on servers have become critical to businesses. But we end up with with too many data touch points to manage efficiently. The solution is to install a Storage Area Network. For many businesses iSCSI is the way to go." David Dale, industry evangelist at Network Appliance.

Creating high performance radio requires high performance storage

Desmond Fuller, IT Director at iBiquity Digital Corp of Columbia MD has become a big believer in the iSCSI format.  iBiquity is the developer of the new digital radio format used by 24 of the top 25 radio stations in the USA.  Testing digital radio feeds chews up lots of storage space. "Each time a new station licenses our technology we need to capture an awful lot of test data to make sure a clear signal will reach every where in the target area."  says Fuller.

"We started off using 200GB for each test, but it quickly became clear that was not sufficient storage.  It did not take us long to realize we needed more than a terabyte’s worth of data to fine tune each new installation.  For a while I used Network Appliance Fibre Channel-based SANs to provide the storage I needed.  When it came time to add another storage array I was offered the chance to try out an iSCSI-based Adaptec Snap Server 18000 SAN.  Adaptec swore it would be just as powerful and much cheaper."

Fuller admits that he was leery that the iSCSI-based system would be able to meet his demanding needs. "On the other hand, we are a private company and when a new technology comes along that promises a better price performance you gotta give it a try.”  Fuller has become a true believer. “My tests show that the Fibre-based SAN is faster, but only 10 to 15% faster. The NetApp provided a host of fancy features not provided by the Snap. But I never used those extra features. And when I found out, I could install two Snaps with three times the amount of storage for the price of one Fibre-based NetApp, my mind was made up”.

“Currently we have two 6-terabyte 18000s installed -- one in our Maryland office and one in NJ.  Each server can scale up to 30 terabytes so we are going to have it for a good long time.“

“The big surprise was how easy it was to install and maintain the 18000.  I figure a small shop could get the Snap installed up and running in half an hour.  Network Appliancesprovides great support, which I needed to use from time to time with the Fibre installation. I have found the Snap to be completely idiot proof.  So I can't tell you much about Adaptec's support.”