EMC Unveils New VNX Unified Storage Family Delivering Record-Breaking Simplicity, Efficiency and Affordability

EMC Corporation, the world leader in information infrastructure solutions, has introduced a new family of unified storage systems – EMC® VNX®.

The new storage solutions consolidate the industry-leading features and functionality of EMC CLARiiON and EMC Celerra into a single, powerful family of unified storage arrays that scale from entry-level to data centre-class systems. The VNXe (for entry) series is designed specifically for small and medium-sized businesses, department-level storage solutions for enterprise, and remote or branch offices, combining breakthrough simplicity with advanced performance, availability and efficiency benefits (see related VNXe Velocity Partner Programme announcement).

The VNXe series delivers unmatched simplicity, efficiency, and affordability for small and medium-sized businesses. Its unique capabilities include the ability to:

1. Provision storage for hundreds of Microsoft Exchange Server mailboxes, or a 1TB VMware data store, in less than 2 minutes.
2. Automatically double storage capacity utilisation using advanced data reduction technologies.
3. Provide automated diagnosis, service, and technical support information in a single click.

The new VNX series provides 3-times simpler management, 3-times the efficiency, and 3-times the performance than current EMC midrange storage systems, enabling customers to:

1. Run Microsoft SQL Server 3-times faster.
2. Run Oracle OLTP 3-times faster.
3. Boot 500 virtual desktops in 8 minutes.
4. Reduce Microsoft SQL Server administration and tuning chores by hours per week.
5. Improve capacity efficiency up to 3-times with the EMC FAST Suite, compression and file de-duplication.

In Q3 2010, EMC was the #1 market share leader in worldwide external disk storage systems with over 26% market share according to IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Disk Storage Systems Tracker (December 2010). The VNX family is the future of EMC’s midrange storage systems, and will extend EMC’s market share leadership. The VNX family is fully optimised for virtual applications, designed with the latest Intel® multi-core processor technology to achieve record-breaking performance. It also introduces new, comprehensive software packages for simple and affordable management and total data protection.

Both the VNXe series and VNX series are managed by EMC Unisphere®, a centralised and simple interface. The VNXe systems are designed for IT professionals with little storage expertise. The unique wizard-based setup and application-centric provisioning enables customers to configure storage for 500 Exchange mailboxes – or 1TB of VMware data stores – in just a few minutes. For small and medium-sized businesses, Unisphere application-driven wizards make VNXe simple to install, simple to provision and simple to manage – with instant access to a self-service online community.

News Summary

1. The EMC® VNX™ family – designed for virtual data centres – converges industry-leading EMC CLARiiON® storage area network (SAN) and EMC Celerra® network attached storage (NAS) systems into a single, unified family of solutions. The VNX family includes the VNXe™ (entry) series with breakthrough simplicity for small and medium businesses, and the VNX series, delivering leadership performance, efficiency, and simplicity for demanding virtual application environments.
2. The VNXe series is the world’s simplest unified storage system, providing application-optimised management and single-click help and support. The VNXe series is designed for the IT Manager who does not specialise in storage.
3. The highly scalable VNX series delivers 3-times simpler management, 3-times better efficiency, and 3-times more performance than current EMC midrange storage systems. With the EMC FAST (Fully Automated Storage Tiering) Suite, including FAST VP (Virtual Pools) and FAST Cache, the VNX series offers superior performance, capacity optimisation, and comprehensive storage management functionality, while exploiting the benefits of Solid State Drives (SSD). The systems dramatically simplify the deployment and management of virtualised applications, including Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server and Microsoft Exchange Server, VMware View virtual desktops, and Oracle databases.

VNXe Series Product Highlights

Powerful application-based provisioning wizards for breakthrough simplicity, including support for Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Hyper-V.

Compact 2U and 3U packaging fits almost any environment.

Built-in support for file-based (CIFS, NFS) and block-based (iSCSI) storage.

No single-point-of-failure design.

Built-in data protection, including replication.

Advanced efficiency features including thin provisioning, file de-duplication and compression.

Integrated self-help and support infrastructure automates and speeds problem resolution.

Advanced 6Gbps high-performance SAS and Nearline SAS drive for high-capacity support.

Scalable up to 120 disk drives (240 TB).

VNX Series Product Highlights

Combines the market-leading capabilities of EMC CLARiiON and EMC Celerra into a single, unified platform – with 3-times the performance of previous generations.

Based on Intel® Xeon® 5600 multi-core processor technology to maximise solution throughput and bandwidth.

Industry’s most advanced automated storage tiering (FAST VP).

Only storage solution offering both automated file and block sub-LUN tiering using FAST VP and powerful, extendable system cache with FAST Cache

Supports 6Gbps SAS, Nearline SAS and SSD drive types.

Scales up-to 2 PB per system (1000 drives).

Support for multiple protocols and data-types including: FC, iSCSI, FCoE, NFS, CIFS, SOAP, REST.

Integrated data protection, security and compliance.