Big Data. Big Decisions
 InformationWeek
Special Coverage Series


StarWind Updates iSCSI SAN Management Software

Version 5.5 adds fault-tolerant features that improve recovery time, performance, synchronization speed and availability of storage attached networks.

By Daniel P. Dern InformationWeek
December 03, 2010 01:16 PM

Storage virtualization software vendor StarWind Software announced on Friday the release of version 5.5 of its StarWind iSCSI storage area network (SAN) management software.

StarWind provides storage management and SAN software for small and midsize companies as an alternative to traditional enterprise-oriented solutions. According to StarWind, "Traditional, legacy high-availability SAN products have always been expensive and complicated. This has been a roadblock for small and midsize companies who are in the process of deploying VMware vSphere, Microsoft Hyper-V and other server applications that need to be configured as Windows server clusters."

StarWind's flagship iSCSI SAN software runs on x86 servers running 32-bit or 64-bit Windows and creates a fault-tolerant iSCSI SAN for use as centralized iSCSI storage or as a SAN. According to the company, StarWind is designed for use as networked storage for VMware, Hyper-V, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft SharePoint and other server applications configured in server clusters.

New features in version 5.5 include a "Heartbeat" feature, improved performance, and new high-availability features.

According to the company, StarWind's new Heartbeat feature "solves a single point of failure problem and prevents an isolation mode by choosing which node stays online serving the client's requests and which node is alive but must stop serving until full recovery of synchronization channel."

The new fast-synchronization option for devices with write-back cache mode shortens the recovery time for performing data synchronization after a node failure.

Additionally, StartWind has added challenge-handshake authentication protocol (CHAP) authentication support to its high-availability plugin; when a high-availability node becomes active, "it is synchronized and brought online automatically if autosync option has been set," according to the company.

Tom Henderson, principal researcher for Extremelabs.com, commented, "Using iSCSI and clustered commodity boxes is becoming more popular for companies who want storage that is reliable but still affordable. This works where their network architecture -- bandwidth -- permits them to push the storage traffic over Ethernet instead of dedicated, more expensive, SAN connectivity like Fibre Channel."

StarWind is available in several editions; pricing begins at $995.

, join the conversation


Related Reading

News

Commentary

Most Popular

On the Web

Slideshow

Video

More Insights

White Papers

More >>

Webcasts

More >>


Currently we allow the following HTML tags in comments:

Single tags

These tags can be used alone and don't need an ending tag.

<br> Defines a single line break

<hr> Defines a horizontal line

Matching tags

These require an ending tag - e.g. <i>italic text</i>

<a> Defines an anchor

<b> Defines bold text

<big> Defines big text

<blockquote> Defines a long quotation

<caption> Defines a table caption

<cite> Defines a citation

<code> Defines computer code text

<em> Defines emphasized text

<fieldset> Defines a border around elements in a form

<h1> This is heading 1

<h2> This is heading 2

<h3> This is heading 3

<h4> This is heading 4

<h5> This is heading 5

<h6> This is heading 6

<i> Defines italic text

<p> Defines a paragraph

<pre> Defines preformatted text

<q> Defines a short quotation

<samp> Defines sample computer code text

<small> Defines small text

<span> Defines a section in a document

<s> Defines strikethrough text

<strike> Defines strikethrough text

<strong> Defines strong text

<sub> Defines subscripted text

<sup> Defines superscripted text

<u> Defines underlined text

BYTE encourages readers to engage in spirited, healthy debate, including taking us to task. However, BYTE moderates all comments posted to our site, and reserves the right to modify or remove any content that it determines to be derogatory, offensive, inflammatory, vulgar, irrelevant/off-topic, racist or obvious marketing/SPAM. BYTE further reserves the right to disable the profile of any commenter participating in said activities.

Disqus Tips To upload an avatar photo, first complete your Disqus profile. | View the list of supported HTML tags you can use to style comments. | Please read our commenting policy.

Follow InformationWeek

By The Numbers

What Are Your Primary Concerns About Using Big Data Software?

Base: 417 respondents at organizations using or planning to deploy data analytics, BI or statistical analysis software
Data: InformationWeek 2013 Analytics, Business Intelligence and Information Management Survey of 541 business technology professionals, October 2012

What Do You Think?

What's your attitude about SQL analysis on top of Hadoop?
We want fast, standard SQL analysis capabilities on Hadoop ASAP
Hadoop is for unstructured data; SQL is for relational databases
We'll give SQL on Hadoop a try, but relational DBs will remain the mainstay
Given strong SQL support on Hadoop, we'd nix the data warehouse
We're not interested in Hadoop
No opinion



Related Content

From Our Sponsor

Five Big Data Challenges and How to Overcome Them with Visual Analytics

Five Big Data Challenges and How to Overcome Them with Visual Analytics

Business leaders often need a visual snapshot of data to quickly grasp and use it. This paper identifies five challenges in presenting data and how visual analytics can resolve them. Solutions are suggested to overcome the challenges of: speed, data clarity, data quality, displaying meaningful results, and dealing with outliers.

Game-Changing Analytics: How IT Executives Can Use Analytics to Create Innovation and Business Success

Game-Changing Analytics: How IT Executives Can Use Analytics to Create Innovation and Business Success

Today's competitive advantage requires a deeper understanding of your business, your market and your customers. As an IT executive, you can drive that knowledge transformation. In this white paper, learn how to make decisions as a strategic business leader and three steps to begin an analytics initiative within your enterprise.

Data Visualization Techniques: From Basics to Big Data with SAS Visual Analytics

Data Visualization Techniques: From Basics to Big Data with SAS Visual Analytics

High-performance data visualization turns sophisticated analyses into meaningful graphics, leading to faster and smarter decision making. In this white paper, learn how visual analytics can transform big data, with additional features such as real-time functionality, mobile compatibility, robust applications for technical groups and accessibility for nontechnical users.

Big Data: Lessons from the Leaders

Big Data: Lessons from the Leaders

Financial performance, competitive advantage, operational efficiency, strategic decision making - every business goal can extract value from big data, and the time for doubt or inaction has long passed. In this Economist Intelligence Unit report, in-depth interviews with data pioneers reveal the link between the effective use of big data and the bottom line among other results.

Decision-Driven Data Management: A Strategy for Better Decisions with Better Data

Decision-Driven Data Management: A Strategy for Better Decisions with Better Data

Which came first, the data or the decision? This white paper makes the case for having a decision in mind, then tailoring big data's volume, variety and velocity to achieve business results such as overcoming customer dissatisfaction or creating well-informed strategies in real time.

Informationweek Reports

Research: The Big Data Management Challenge

Research: The Big Data Management Challenge

The challenge of big data is real, but most organizations don't differentiate 'big data' from traditional data, and nearly 90% of respondents to our survey use conventional databases as the primary means of handling data. We'll help you understand what constitutes big data (it's not just size) and the numerous management challenges it poses.