Conference ssag::ask_ssag

6531.0. "Sun FC announcement." by OTOOA::JPOND () Mon Mar 31 1997 08:16

The attached is from Information Week. Does anyone have any
information on this forthcoming product?

Thanks,
Jim



_____Sun Bets On Fibre Channel: A New Storage Strategy____
On April 7, Sun Microsystems' storage division will announce 
an ambitious storage architecture based on the ANSI standard 
Fibre Channel storage interface. If successful, Sun's Open 
Storage Network Model could change the way the way storage 
is bought, put together, and managed.

The essential component of Sun's storage model will be a 
Fibre Channel switch, similar in concept to a networking 
router, which will contribute to data transfer between array 
nodes at speeds of 1 Gbyte per second. The fastest storage 
architectures available today move data at speeds of 100 
Mbytes per second. 

In Sun's network model, the hard drives, memory, cache, 
controller, software, and hardware are components around the 
Fibre Channel switch. Adding capacity involves simply adding 
more drives, instead of updating the whole system. "The rest 
of the industry looks at Fibre Channel as a faster SCSI 
bus," says Robin Harris, Sun's senior product manager for 
Fibre Channel products. "We look at it as a high-performance, 
high-availability network optimized for storage."

Fibre Channel is the next-generation interface, eventually 
replacing SCSI, and is endorsed by most system and storage 
vendors, including EMC, IBM, Seagate Software, Hewlett-
Packard, Digital Equipment, and Data General's Clariion storage 
unit. On April 7, Sun will announce availability of its 
second-generation Fibre Channel-based storage products. 
While only a handful of vendors have shipped Fibre Channel-based 
products, Sun shipped its first Fibre Channel-based storage 
array three years ago.--Martin Garvey