ENTERTAINMENT

BlueArc Corporation, provider of the world's highest performance, most scalable network storage systems, today announced availability of a new comprehensive software suite for Titan. This release, which customers can easily integrate into existing Titan storage systems, features advanced capabilities in multiple areas, including Virtual Servers, Data Migration, iSCSI support, Remote Volume Mirroring and the introduction of a Write Once Read Many (WORM) file system. These enhancements, licensed individually or in combination, provide users with industry-leading storage management features, ultimately increasing the speed of data access and interaction, boosting productivity. BlueArc's software release consists of five major components, including: Virtual Servers: BlueArc's new Virtual Server capabilities provide end-users with the ability to create up to eight logical servers within each physical Titan. Each virtual server can have a separate IP address, multiple management policies, and dedicated port bandwidth. Storage mount points are virtualized and each virtual server can be quickly and easily moved between Titans in both standalone and clustered configurations. This enables improved workflow and customer satisfaction, as administrators can migrate virtual servers to match project workloads, usage patterns, availability and other requirements. Data Migrator: BlueArc's Data Migrator feature enables administrators to create policies based on a set of rules, parameters and triggers to migrate data from one tier of storage to another. The migration occurs automatically and transparently to the end user or application. Using Data Migrator, administrators can ensure data is stored on the appropriate storage tier, in line with business requirements, as it moves through its data life cycle. Policy based management greatly simplifies data management and improves overall storage utilization and efficiency. iSCSI: BlueArc's iSCSI support enables sustained wire speed performance for block-level data transfer over standard IP networks, using SCSI commands. Using BlueArc's hardware-accelerated architecture, each individual Titan can support over 8,000 LUNs, enabling customers to consolidate applications and take advantage of advanced virtualization, data protection and data management features for both block level and file level storage in a single, scalable, easy to manage solution. Remote Volume Mirroring: BlueArc's Remote Volume Mirroring capabilities enable system drives located in different RAID arrays to be synchronously replicated at the block level, facilitating real-time mirroring of data at different locations, up to 10 kilometers apart. BlueArc is introducing two configurations -- a campus configuration capable of mirroring up to 500 meters, and a metro distance of up to 10 kilometers. Utilizing remote volume mirroring, customers can increase data protection, avoiding unintentional loss of data and minimizing downtime in the event of a catastrophic failure. WORM File System: Extending BlueArc's multi-tiered storage offerings, featuring multiple disk types and speeds in a single physical system, BlueArc is introducing a WORM file system, which prevents data on a disk from being modified or deleted for a user-specified time period. When used in conjunction with supported third-party data life cycle management applications, BlueArc's WORM file system provides the protection from data loss or corruption required to meet regulatory or compliance requirements -- without requiring the purchase of an additional server. "The BlueArc Titan brings a lot to the table as a high-end IP-based storage system," said Tony Asaro, senior analyst for the Enterprise Strategy Group. "Scalable file systems, performance and data protection are very important but the conversation shouldn't end there. This latest release brings a number of important software features including intelligent tiered storage, iSCSI support, write once read many (WORM) and virtual systems. The BlueArc intelligent multi-tiered storage enables customers to respond to the demands of the customer's business and deliver the right capability at the right time. There are a number of vendors that are talking about tiered storage but BlueArc actually has intelligent, policy-driven tools that make it a compelling and effective solution." "Over the last year, BlueArc has moved further into the enterprise market, where speed of data access and data integrity are absolutely critical," said Steve Daheb, vice president of marketing for BlueArc. "This software release is another step towards making sure that we provide these customers with the absolute best storage option available today. Only BlueArc is able to combine high performance with the ability to adapt storage as business conditions change, ensuring that data is available as needed." BlueArc's new software features are available immediately for existing customers, and are designed for integration with the company's Titan storage system, which allows a single file system to grow up to 256 terabytes and delivers throughput of up to 20 Gigabits per second (Gbps) -- providing the best performance and return on investment in the storage industry. BlueArc's unique hardware-based architecture allows customers to scale a single Titan far beyond any other product available today, adapting to changing application or capacity needs, simplifying management, accelerating productivity and protecting long-term investment.