Dot Hill's AsssureUVS Software Virtualizes Storage

Primarily known as a storage hardware OEM whose customers include Fujitsu, HDS, HP, NEC, NetApp and Oracle/Sun, as well as more recently selling under its own brand, Dot Hill is branching out into software with the launch of a new portfolio of unified virtual storage solutions branded AssuredUVS. Representatives say the initial product is a dedicated appliance that consolidates and virtualizes storage across server applications, storage protocols, environments, and mixed storage platforms.

Dot Hill builds on the January acquisition of Cloverleaf Communications, and replaces its Intelligent Storage Networking System (iSN), 'an intelligent, network resident, storage network management system that  delivers linear scalability, strong fault tolerance and high levels of availability' targeted at mid to large-sized data centers.

Available in two packages that start shipping in December, the new solutions unify storage area networks (SAN) with networked attached storage (NAS), bringing them under common management tools, and simplifying operations through a single management interface. The company says users can manage both block storage and file storage all under a common user interface. Data management features include snapshots, thin provisioning, tiered provisioning, replication, synchronous mirroring, and data migration.

AssuredUVS Standard has 50 terabytes (TB) of storage included, and can scale to 150 TB, while the Datacenter edition, which offers more instances of supported features, scales up to 6 petabytes (PB). Both versions work in virtually every operating and hypervisor environment including Windows, Linux, Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, Mac OS, VMware vSpereand Microsoft Hyper-V. They also support storage models from a wide variety of vendors including Apple, Dot Hill, EMC, Hitach/HDS, HP, IBM, LSI/Engenio, NetApp, Nexsan, Oracle, Promise, Xiotech, and Xyratex. List prices start at $63,360 for AssuredUVS Standard models with dual controllers for high availability. Asynchronous Replication and NAS support are sold as additions to the base package.

There's a lot of opportunity for this new product family, says Mark Peters, senior analyst, at Enterprise Strategy Group. "Such opportunity can be turned to business success as long as DotHill is able to make the market see its often-hidden strengths (virtualized, economic, unified storage), rather than its often-obvious weaknesses (being obscured behind, and reliant upon, a few OEM partners)."Peters says customers are looking for storage solutions that not only deliver immediate value, but that also enable flexibility over time, so that storage can adapt to changes in an organization's applications, user needs or business demands. Virtualization is a key component of this flexibility, he states, and storage virtualization will experience rapid growth for the forseeable future, providing excellent market opportunities for vendors - such as DotHill - with the right mix of capabilities and offerings.

According to IDC's Richard Villars, vice president of storage and IT executive strategies, the biggest barrier to making server virtualization a scalable, flexible foundation for the vast majority of IT workloads is the failure to also deploy a virtualized storage infrastructure. "Solutions like Dot Hill's new universal storage solution will make it possible for more organizations to actually obtain the hoped for gains in IT efficiency and reliability promised in virtual server build-outs."