HP's top-end array just TOPPED ITSELF HP has announced the XP7, the successor to the high-end XP array. The XP, or P9500, is an OEM version of Hitachi's VSP array and Hitachi has announced the VSP G1000 follow-on product, which HP has manufactured as the XP7. HP says it is the "highest performing, full-featured, enterprise-class disk array." That means it's better …
"HP says it is the "highest performing, full-featured, enterprise-class disk array." "
Operated and supported by the last bunch of junior staff before the chop, since we're a company that, each and every quarter, acquires a pointless company of X staff, just to axe the same number of X staff, the quarter after, all in the senior ranks, with support being a mother f***ing priority.
For customers that don't see that as a bloody problem and risk to their business, don't hesitate to ring them and get the usual marketing bullshit.
For customers that rang HP more than 6 months ago, ring me anytime to restore your business, partially or in total, depending on your backup policies and performance.
Bye.
Anon, for commercial reasons.
I don't know why HP continues on with HDS unless they just want more time to try to migrate them to 3PAR. It is clear that HP believes 3PAR to be the future of their storage line. As their highest end array is clearly not their highest end priority, I am not sure why people wouldn't buy EMC or IBM... or HDS direct if they really want VSP. HP can't sell that many of these things. The only justification they have for keeping HDS/XP in the line-up is that they need it for IBM mainframe attach, which 3PAR doesn't support. True, but IBM mainframe shops predominantly use DS8. If not DS8, they use VMAX. Then there are a handful that use HDS. I have to think the number of mainframe shops on HP branded HDS is well under 100. After all HP's song and dance for the last 30 years is that people should get off the mainframe... what is the sales pitch? "In case you disagree with our fervent stance against the mainframe, please use our storage for your mainframe."
Printer ink and IP(*). Well that is what I was informed when contracting with them, circa 2K - although it might be different now. However they did have a large legal department in the same area as the R&D bods back then.
(*) Yes, HP - even though they are not that bad in the context of things, really did send their R&D staff to sunny climes, so they could 'think' of tech spins on on the then current tech, and get the legal bods to start the protection process. (Round corners don't have anything on them).
There's obviously still a big enough / though slightly niche market for HP to make money outside of 3PAR and it's not necessarily just mainframe. In-band storage virtualization, complex DR scenarios, legacy applications and supporting operating systems, super secure / weird sites, entrenched storage environments including their long established admin practices and all the associated dependencies spring to mind.
Traditional Tier 1 storage was always services led from all the vendors, requiring relatively complex and heavy service engagements. So there's probably still plenty of margin to be had for HP/EMC/HDS & IBM with the right kind of Customer.
I agree with the advantages of VSP to 3PAR. I just don't know why anyone would go with HP's branded version of VSP, essentially that is what it is, when HP would prefer to sell 3PAR as their "tier one" (in their opinion) system. In any situation where a customer says "tell me what I should use for x workload", HP is going to say 3PAR unless x workload is mainframe... and almost no one talks to HP if they are looking for mainframe storage.
I think mainframe, or other specialty protocol storage... but primarily mainframe, is also becoming the only situation where tier one makes sense, note becoming (not today). Scale out and cluster storage, along with all-Flash arrays and internal storage in a cluster, are taking over the high performance, high reliability space that the big three used to dominate. There will be tier one storage as long as there are mainframes (i.e. forever), but it will be a smaller market.
The storage market is not going to be pleasant in coming years. More and more people just want to buy a bunch of x86 servers for a low cost, use internal disk and cluster in the Google model... or just use the cloud services of someone who operates with that architecture.
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