Dell Enhances Software-Defined Storage Portfolio With Web-Scale Converged Appliances

Dell, Inc. announced its second wave of XC Series of Web-scale Converged Appliances.

Dell XC630

These scalable integrated solutions help streamline the datacenter and offer more than 50% storage capacity and up to twice the rack density to support customers deploying a range of workloads, including VDIs, private cloud and big data.

The Dell XC Series Version 2.0 appliances offer customers hyper-converged solutions based for the first time on PowerEdge 13^th generation server technology combined with Nutanix, Inc and Dell global services and support. The appliances integrate enterprise storage, compute and hypervisor resources into a single solution, and further expand Dell’s software-defined storage (SDS) portfolio.

“We’ve seen strong customer interest in our debut Dell XC Series appliances, and our newest offerings substantially raise the bar,” said Alan Atkinson, VP and GM, Dell storage. “The new web-scale converged appliances add greater configuration flexibility and pack more performance and capacity into our 13th generation servers, making them even more compelling for customers looking to adopt a newer, integrated systems model for delivering IT to their organizations.“

Customers’ interest in integrated systems continues to grow with the opportunity to deploy simplified yet powerful solutions that offer high performance, fast deployment and lower operational costs.

In fact, the XC Series offers up to 27% lower cost and up to six times faster time to value compared to a traditional VDI solution approach, according to recent analysis from IT research firm Wikibon.

XC Series Appliances Improve Performance and Flexibility
to Support Web-Scale Deployments
The next wave of the XC Series of Web-scale Converged Appliances offers customers a range of integrated solutions for various workloads in virtualized environments. This includes the XC Series XC630 and XC730xd, built on Dell PowerEdge 13th generation server technology.

Dell XC730xd

Appliances offer substantial enhancements to debut XC Series
and support customers with:

• Faster application performance – Higher performance servers and additional drives options (flash and HDD) support more demanding workloads in VDI, private cloud and big data initiatives.

• Greater density – Doubling the density to 16TB per rack unit, supports the same amount of data in half the rack space, benefiting all types of customers, and especially MSPs and those in co-located data centers.

• Flexibility – Advances in processing and memory, combined with multiple drive, memory and processor options per appliance, enable more precise workload matching and granular scalability.

The XC630 introduces a compact 1U form factor to the XC Series portfolio and supports more virtual desktop users in half the rack space compared to Dell’s debut XC720xd, making it an even more attractive option for customers with limited rack space or those deploying VDI and other virtualized workloads. The XC730xd (2U) can support 60% more storage – up to 32TP – compared to the previous generation, benefitting many customers, especially those deploying private cloud or big data workloads.

Northern Alberta Institute of Technology Selects XC Series Appliances
to Support Virtual Desktop Initiative
The Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT), a Canadian polytechnic, has chosen XC Series appliances to support a large-scale deployment of its Centre for Applied Technologies VDI shared services initiative.

“The Dell XC Series provides a scalable infrastructure that’s designed to support VDIs, such as our Centre for Applied Technologies,” said Daryl Allenby, director of IT infrastructure and operations, NAIT. “By streamlining the deployment and management of virtualized workloads, The Dell XC Series will enable us to support 5,000 full-time students plus staff with an easily scalable infrastructure for virtual desktops. With its all-around simplicity to set up, manage and expand, we can shift our focus from managing IT operations to creating innovative solutions that add greater value for our institute.“

The XC Series is designed to be easily deployed and incrementally scaled, lowering TCO and supporting the agility for customers to add new appliances in minutes in a pay-as-you-grow model. Customers can deploy multiple virtualized workloads using the same infrastructure and can respond to business changes by scaling their IT environment one node at time without the need to overprovision based on anticipated growth.

The appliances enable customers to manage their virtual environments at a VM level, making them for VDI, private cloud, high performance server virtualization, and datacenters using multiple hypervisor platforms. Initial customers hail from a range of industries including large financial services, manufacturing and media companies.

The XC Series of Web-scale Converged Appliances, Version 2.0, will be available in North America, South America, Europe, Middle-East and Africa on March 3 and elsewhere worldwide later this March.

“Dell has emerged as a global leader in software-defined storage solutions, based on its unique, broad and embracing approach to work closely with key storage software vendors to deliver robust, validated solutions on Dell hardware that’s backed by Dell global services and support,” said Scott Sinclair, senior analyst, Enterprise Strategy Group. “The Dell and Nutanix marriage is a win for both companies, and, ultimately, customers. Nutanix gains by partnering with a global leader with proven server technology and services, and Dell gains by being the only large vendor integrating its servers with Nutanix’s market leading hyperconverged software. Customers get the known quality and support of Dell plus Nutanix’s easily scaled and managed software for virtualized environments.“