NETWORK WORLD NEWSLETTER: MIKE KARP on
STORAGE IN THE ENTERPRISE
01/17/02
Today's focus: The values of virtualization

Dear Wincenty Kaminski,

In this issue:

* The benefits of storage virtualization
* Links related to storage
* Featured reader resource

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Today's focus: The values of virtualization

By Mike Karp

*****
Editor's Note: The storage newsletter that was sent to you on
Jan. 10 and headlined "How critical is your data?", was sent
with only half of its text. The full version of the article is
archived at Network World Fusion and can be viewed at
http://www.nwfusion.com/newsletters/stor/2002/01167328.html

We apologize for any incovenience caused.
*****

It's evident that virtualization still hasn't captured the
hearts and minds of the storage-buying public at this point.
With the technology having so much to offer, it is reasonable
to ask just why aren't the virtualization vendors taking a
serious piece of the storage revenue that is being spent these
days?

Part of the reason, and we have harped on this before, is that
the virtualization companies have not done a particularly good
job of defining either their market space or their solutions
for the world's IT managers. Another reason, a bit less
obvious, is contained in the interesting relationship between
the purchase of storage-area networks (SAN) and the
implementation of virtualization.

SANs are moving into the enterprise IT space at a steady but
slow pace. A major cause of the slow adoption rate is
attributable to the fact that most components in today's SANs,
despite vendors' interoperability claims to the contrary, have
a tough time working with products from multiple vendors. This
means that implementing a SAN requires either going with
products from a single vendor (or a small group of vendors
designated by the prime vendor), or going through major
integration and interoperability challenges every time a new
device is added to the storage network. As a result, at this
point many IT organizations are opting to go the homogeneous,
single-vendor route, gritting their teeth as they realize that
by doing so they lose a lot of financial leverage by limiting
their selection of suppliers.

Homogeneous SANs present a problem for the virtualization
vendors, because one of the major benefits they can deliver is
the ability to pool disks. More to the point, with virtualized
storage the storage media can be pooled irrespective of
vendors, size and configurations. And most to the point, this
pooled storage is seen as a single volume and can all be
managed with a single piece of management software.
Applications and operating systems address the virtualized pool
of data only, the individual pieces of storage hardware having
become, in a sense, invisible.

This opportunity for an integrated storage management console
to manage the entire storage resource offers tremendous
opportunities, including the ability to add, shut down or
reassign individual elements within the virtualized pool
without bringing down the rest of the storage system. The
bottom line: with such a capability, IT managers not only save
by purchasing hardware from a variety of vendors, they can
achieve a more efficient operation by managing this mix-and-
match collection of devices from with a single piece of
software.

Unfortunately, when selling into the homogeneous SAN
environment, this major cost-saving benefit disappears, making
it harder to achieve a quick payback on the purchase of the
virtualization products.

The values of virtualization are by no means limited to the
single management console, nor are they limited to SANs
(although that is where most of the marketing direction is
placed today). It seems likely that the vendors, many of whom
have quite a bit to offer, might make themselves much more
viable in this turbulent marketplace if they focused on some of
the other benefits they are capable of providing.

In the mean time, these grey days of January and February may
be just the opportunity for you to start looking into all of
this. (Note to my readers in the southern hemisphere: your
sunny summer days, which curiously enough come at the same time
of year, are equally timely.)

There are lots of players in the SAN market these days, taking
a variety of different approaches to the implementation of
their solutions. I've listed some here for those of you who
feel you are ready to set the bit between your teeth and really
start to examine these guys. Such an effort may likely be worth
your while.

Players in the SAN market:

Compaq http://www.compaq.com

Datacore http://www.datacore.com

Falconstor http://www.falconstor.com

Hewlett Packard http://www.hp.com

StoreAge http://www.store-age.com/storeage_web/index.html

Tivoli http://www.tivoli.com

TruSAN http://www.truesan.com

Vertias http://www.veritas.com

Vicom Systems http://www.vicom.com

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To contact Mike Karp:

Mike Karp is senior analyst with Enterprise Management
Associates (http://www.enterprisemanagement.com) in Boulder,
Colo., an analyst and market research firm focusing exclusively
on enterprise management. He works out of Portsmouth, N.H., and
Westboro, Mass., and can be reached via e-mail at
mailto:mkarp@enterprisemanagement.com
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RELATED EDITORIAL LINKS

Archive of the Storage newsletter:
http://www.nwfusion.com/newsletters/stor/index.html
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