Stories by Lucas Mearian

  • Cisco mounts storage offensive

    Cisco Systems, the 800-pound gorilla of networking, said last week that it's jumping into the Fibre Channel storage area network arena with its own switches and directors. The move poses the first major challenge to Brocade Communications Systems and McData, which together claim about 86 per cent of the switch marketplace.

  • Sun unveils new standards-based storage software

    Sun Microsystems this week plans to introduce advances to its storage-area network (SAN) management software, including the first use of two standards that are the cornerstone of an industry-wide effort to bridge the interoperability gap in multi-vendor SANs.

  • PC disk drive technology heads to data centres

    For companies seeking to store mission-critical data, disk arrays configured with SCSI-attached drives have typically been the only game in town. Lower-cost drives based on the Advanced Technology Attachment (ATA) standard, while plentiful in PCs, lacked the performance and reliability needed at the data centre level.

  • Microsoft drops OS plans for InfiniBand

    Microsoft last week disclosed that it no longer plans to build an InfiniBand management capability into the upcoming Windows .Net Server operating system, dealing another blow to the new high-speed I/O architecture.

  • Rivals EMC and HP to exchange APIs

    Rivals EMC and Hewlett-Packard have agreed to expand a cross-licensing agreement for certain storage system application programming interfaces (API), a move that will eventually allow the development of storage management software capable of controlling each other's storage devices.

  • Intel kills InfiniBand chip program

    In a move that some experts say is a blow to the emerging InfiniBand market, Intel yesterday announced to partners that it has killed plans to produce silicon chips that would allow for high-speed server clustering and communication with other devices, such as storage arrays.

  • HP lays out storage plans

    The post-merger Hewlett-Packard announced plans today for a new storage division, dubbed Network Storage Solutions (NSS), that will include merging some products while phasing others out completely during the next five years.

  • EMC offers disk array as tape alternative

    Continuing to look for ways to jump-start its sales EMC announced last week a relatively inexpensive disk array for storing fixed data, such as check images, software source code and medical X-rays. Prospective users said the device could provide a speedier alternative to tape storage.

  • Wall Street looks to fend off cyberterrorism

    Wall Street IT executives are hammering home the point that hacking and cyberterrorism is a mounting threat best fought by the private sector and government through creation of a centralised way of alerting and disseminating information about attacks -- most likely via a private Web site.