NetApp becomes Quantum reseller

NetApp has signed up to resell Quantum's StorNext software, opening the way for it to sell hybrid disk and tape systems. StorNext is a virtualised file system manager that provides both SAN and LAN access to a shared set of files with automated data tiering across fast disk, capacity disk and tape libraries, plus deduplication …

[Anonymous Coward]

So much for cluster mode

This move speaks volumes about how NetApp feels internally about their currect abortion of an attempt at scale out NAS. They screwed around for so many years with the spinnaker tech, and prayed at the alter of WAFL for so long, that Isilon was able to speed right past them with better, less ancient tech, and scoop up half their customers. Now with EMC pushing them further, Isilon will take every last scale out NAS customer away from NetApp over the next couple years.

And because WAFL is such ancient tech, and doesn't scale, the are forced to finally start reselling someone else's file system, instead of using their own tech, in a last gasp attempt to remain relevant in this space.

NetApps days truly are numbered.

[Mr Atoz]

@Anonymous Coward - You Are Delusional!

Isilon scooped up half of NetApp's customers? Where the heck do you get that data from? Isilon technology is cool but it too has it's holes and it certainly does not scale as well as they claim. Once you peel back the layers the Isilon story is not that rosy, trust me!

NetApp has several competitors breathing down their neck but they are still the leader and will be for some time.

[dikrek]

Do you even know what cluster mode does?

Mr. Anonymous Coward...

Dimitris from NetApp here.

NetApp hosts the biggest workloads around (NAS or SAN), and scales just fine. StorNext is NOT scale-out NAS... instead, it's a block-based cluster FS for very specific applications. Not a general-purpose solution.

FYI, Isilon and other scale-out solutions are not for all workloads - scale-out storage doesn't necessarily mean scale-out random write small-block I/O, for example. But it is usually good for reads, especially large files, and allows easy to achieve single large namespaces.

You can't even begin to compare how many customers NetApp and Isilon have respectively. NetApp is one of the top storage manufacturers and makes general-purpose storage, Isilon has a few niche customers and makes scale-out NAS.

D