Hi -

I am debating over a NetApp 3020c filer with sata drives or an
equallogic iSCSI san with 2 servers running MS Server Enterprise 2003
r2 for CIFS sharing.  We are looking at growing this evnviroment to
40TB over the next few years.  Performance is important but not too
critical (thus the sata drives in the netapp) - cost is more important
at this time.  I would also like to consolidate our SQL and exchange to
the same storage over time.  The netapp seems a lot more expensive as
you need to snap to another netapp with that much data before backup so
it requires 2 expensive storage systems rather then just scaling the
equallogic to meet snap requirements for backup window.  Any
suggestions would be helpful...  Also, has anyone out there had any
luck with NAS cluster with 2003 r2 server for cifs sharing?  Any info
would be great.

Thanks

Tom

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"bh1" <bharkol1@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1141861313.795069.70470@e56g2000cwe.googlegroups.com...
> Hi -
>
> I am debating over a NetApp 3020c filer with sata drives or an
> equallogic iSCSI san with 2 servers running MS Server Enterprise 2003
> r2 for CIFS sharing.  We are looking at growing this evnviroment to
> 40TB over the next few years.  Performance is important but not too
> critical (thus the sata drives in the netapp) - cost is more important
> at this time.  I would also like to consolidate our SQL and exchange to
> the same storage over time.  The netapp seems a lot more expensive as
> you need to snap to another netapp with that much data before backup so
> it requires 2 expensive storage systems rather then just scaling the
> equallogic to meet snap requirements for backup window.  Any
> suggestions would be helpful...  Also, has anyone out there had any
> luck with NAS cluster with 2003 r2 server for cifs sharing?  Any info
> would be great.
>
> Thanks
>
> Tom

There's no need for two Filer's to make a snapshot for backups, you can do
that withinin a single box as well. In fact, that's how most of my customers
run it. You can then use NDMP to drive a tape library hanging directly off
the Filer.

NetApp sees themselves as a software vendor, the hardware only facilitates
what they want to sell you. Equallogic is a hardware vendor who include a
number of software functions to support their main goal; sell you more
disks.

Rob

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BH1:

vendor disclaimer (I work at EqualLogic)

I would suggest taking this to a reseller who either supplies both or
go to two resellers and pose the question to them.  I would be leary of
the advice you get on the forums... littered  with vendor hype ; )
Put the ball in your court and demand an eval unit and a testing
timeframe to look at performance.  Put them head to head and see what
happens for yourself.  That's how I'd do it if I were in your shoes.
Saying "we are growing to 40TB" to one of our sales reps or resellers
should buy you some bargaining power - definitely with EQL, not sure
with NetApp.

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

On 8 Mar 2006 15:41:53 -0800, "bh1" <bharkol1@yahoo.com> wrote:

>Hi -
>
>I am debating over a NetApp 3020c filer with sata drives or an
>equallogic iSCSI san with 2 servers running MS Server Enterprise 2003
>r2 for CIFS sharing.  We are looking at growing this evnviroment to
>40TB over the next few years.  Performance is important but not too
>critical (thus the sata drives in the netapp) - cost is more important
>at this time.  I would also like to consolidate our SQL and exchange to
>the same storage over time.  The netapp seems a lot more expensive as
>you need to snap to another netapp with that much data before backup so
>it requires 2 expensive storage systems rather then just scaling the
>equallogic to meet snap requirements for backup window.  Any
>suggestions would be helpful...  Also, has anyone out there had any
>luck with NAS cluster with 2003 r2 server for cifs sharing?  Any info
>would be great.
>
>Thanks
>
>Tom


Disclaimer:  I am an end user of NetApp, and love it.

Doing a bake off when you don't have heavy performance or
functionality requirements (like extended DR, Continuous Access, etc)
is, imo, a waste of time.  For the basic stuff just about every vendor
will function adequately.

NetApp is probably going to be more expensive, at least in the short
term, but they are chock full of feature that you may likely grow
into; features you won't get anywhere else, no matter what the vendor
says.  I offer snapshots as an example: a recent (new) vendor of ours
says they do snapshots but as we've recently, and painfully,
discovered it's a bastardization compared to NetApp.

We also use iSCSI a fair amount, though mostly it's CIFS and NFS.
iSCSI is working very well for us and will continue to be used and
grown for some time.

Rob already answered the issue of backing up to another filer, but I
need to ask; where did you get the notion you had to have two to
perform a backup?

I'm not sure I understand you're question about NAS clustering and
2003 r2.  Care to elaborate?  I mean, failover works beautifully with
NetApp for CIFS, NFS, and iSCSI from personal experience.  I haven't
done anything with the FC side of it though.

~F

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

I would look at fiber channel storage instead.  If you need to do a
cluster it would not make sence to do it over iSCSI.  You will need the
qlogic toe cards which cost the same amount as an HBA.  For that just
get a CX500 clariion.

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

On 14 Mar 2006 10:44:33 -0800, "carmelomcc"
<carmelo.mccutcheon@gmail.com> wrote:

>I would look at fiber channel storage instead.  If you need to do a
>cluster it would not make sence to do it over iSCSI.  You will need the
>qlogic toe cards which cost the same amount as an HBA.  For that just
>get a CX500 clariion.


You certainly DO NOT need TOE cards for iSCSI.  We run iSCSI over the
same gig connection that client traffic runs on and it works fine.  If
you want major performance then you could just put in another gig NIC
and run storage traffic seperately.

In fact, during our internal testing, we found hardware iSCSI cards
underperformed compared to software initiators.  Primary reason is all
the tweaks available in software where the hwardware cards were on or
off, no real adjustments.

~JK

[ Post a follow-up to this message ]

I think you are going to find the Equallogic solution to be more cost
effective. Not only that, but I think a CLEAN HA SAN design is less
thorny than clustered NAS.  A big complex SAN with a huge number of
ports - no - but a relatively small iSCSI SAN - yes.

The other thing to look at is how close the vendors appear to be with
Microsoft. Equallogic has an edge here, but that's not to say Netapp
won't work with Microsoft because they clearly have successfully worked
with Microsoft products for many years, even though there was some low
level posturing/fueding going on over Exchange support. IMHO, Netapp is
the best of the old school storage companies and Equallogic is the best
new kid on the block. You've winnowed your choice down to the two best
players and I suspect you'll be happy with either one.

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