Real Improvements

5:55 PM -- Hewlett-Packard's latest product blitz has tongues wagging. (And we do mean today's product blitz, not yesterday's, or the one before that.) (See HP's Storage & Security Blitz, HP Vows More Virtualization, and HP Hoists Software Upgrades.)

Some talk is about the EVA series. Instead of rejoicing in the claimed 24 percent performance gain, at least one observer thinks the whole lineup's in need of complete revision.

"Ok, so we have a slight performance enhancement, but where is the 4-Gig back end? Where is the enhanced cache?" demands Greg Schulz of the StorageIO consultancy in James Rogers' summary article today.

Others, including at least one poster on our message boards, are picking on HP for its style of thin provisioning.

This is only to be expected. Among big storage suppliers, no good deed goes unpunished. Further, HP isn't alone in catching flak about its time-tested storage systems. Just ask NetApp or EMC. (See NetApp's Kidd Talks Turkey, EMC Talks Disk & De-Dupe, and Reports: EMC to Replace Centera.)Like its competitors, HP is serious about its markets -- and market share. (See Disk Vendors at It Again.) And the company continues to hammer away at its basic storage structure in an effort to eliminate obstacles. (See HP Hires Hitachi CEO.)

But it's a basic tenet of storage technology that the bigger you get, the tougher it is to be nimble. It's also hard to revise something that continues to bring home the bacon -- even if the bacon is a wee bit fatty. We'll see if HP takes action in time to avoid a grease fire.

Mary Jander, Site Editor, Byte and Switch