STORAGE: What's in Store?

Merger Mania



We've had a $13 bn merger between Symantec and Veritas. McData just

gobbled up CNT, and EMC's acquisitions will soon surpass the number of

McDonalds franchises in North America. Look for more mergers in 2005. Lots more,

and lots of big ones too.

Virtue in Virtualization?



While virtualization has been a buzz word for years, the signs are that some

vendors are getting closer. Though the actuality is unlikely to match the hype,

major players like EMC, IBM and Hitachi are working hard on virtualization

technology. In addition, upstarts like Katana (or VirtuOS Computing as it plans

to rename itself) are keeping very hush-hush about virtual multiprocessor

technology using inexpensive PCs.

Gateway to Heaven?



NAS gateways represented a major market shift in 2004. And they will

continue to this year. EMC gained significant market share last year due to its

support of NAS gateway initiatives. It offers Celerra running in front of

Symmetrix as a NAS gateway option, while NetApp offers a gateway to HDS and HP

systems. Newcomers like OnStor and Acopie also offer interesting NAS gateway

products.

Less Fuzzy iSCSI



The battle between Fibre Channel and iSCSI is on! iSCSI not only has low

cost on its side. It is also catching up fast in terms of performance. Expect

iSCSI to carve a larger slice of the pie and FC vendors to strike back with

slashed costs. Either way, users win.

Comply or Die



With some deadlines past and others looming, compliance is high on the

storage agenda for 2005. Enterprise Strategy Group predicts that the total

volume of compliant records worldwide will increase from 376 petabytes in 2003

to 1,644 petabytes by 2006.

ILM Hype



Faster than a speeding disk drive; more powerful than a POWER5 processor;

able to leap tall Symmetrix boxes in a single bound. Is it a bird, is it a

plane, no-it's I—L—M! Information Lifecycle Management. Like it or

loathe it, no vendor can afford to ignore ILM. Unlike 2004, actual products may

even arrive on the market showing early-day ILM features.

Switching the Switches



4-Gbps switching has arrived. Brocade and HP are first to market. IBM isn't

far behind. By the end of the year, every storage and r switch vendor will be

delivering 4-Gbps gear.

Tiny Disk Drive



We've had 3.5-inch drives for a while now, so its time for a change. Look

for 2.5-inch drives to become more available in rack-mounted and server-blade

systems.

Long Live the Tape



Yes. They've been saying it for years. Tape is finally dead. And what

takes over? A better kind of tape. LTO3 tape systems from the likes of HP, IBM

and Quantum can now be purchased, thereby doubling the capacity of tape to 400

GB uncompressed, and increasing the data transfer rate to 80 MBps.

Power to the User



While 2004 was the year that the ASNP boosted its membership numbers, 2005

will see the return of user power in an industry that sorely needs it. Look for

many exciting programs to emerge this year that will give you more say on how

vendors produce products.

Source : Robb Dennis, Association of Storage Networking Professionals