New 8Gb Switches and HBAs From Brocade

Brocade announced a series of industry-leading data center fabric switches and server HBAs that deliver a new level of end-to-end data center networking performance. In addition, the Company announced new advanced networking capabilities across both switches and HBAs that greatly simplifies the end-to-end management of server and storage environments, including data migration and data security, in data centers.

Augmenting the industry-leading performance of the Brocade DCX Backbone and 48000 director, the new family of 8Gbit/sec fibre channel switches ranges in capacity from 8 to 80 ports, and offers the highest levels of performance in the industry. Brocade’s new 8Gbit/sec HBAs also set new performance standards, and leverage Brocade’s technological expertise in delivering advanced capabilities for storage and data center networks. Together, the new products offer unmatched server-to-storage connectivity and capabilities, supporting features such as fabric Quality of Service (QoS), traffic management and other Adaptive Networking services that benefit evolving data centers.

"The use of server virtualization for optimized asset utilization and cost-effective disaster recovery is driving the need for more dynamic movement of data and applications across different physical server environments," said Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) Analyst Bob Laliberte. "QoS and flow control characteristics associated with these ‘mobile’ applications need to follow the application as it moves among systems. Brocade’s 8Gbit/sec switches and HBAs provide the performance levels and end-to-end adaptive networking services capabilities to address these real ‘next-generation’ challenges."

According to a recent ESG survey, enterprise customers currently using server virtualization expect to double the number of physical servers equipped for virtualization and increase the number of virtual servers running on them by more than 150%. With this tremendous growth, data center managers will require high performance networks with the capability to assign network services like bandwidth or priority to each guest on a virtual server. Brocade is the first company to offer these "end-to-end" capabilities that extend from the application to the physical and virtual server, through the data center fabric and to storage devices with adaptive networking capabilities.

Brocade server-to-storage connectivity solutions are an integral component of Brocade’s Data Center Fabric (DCF) architecture. The Brocade DCF architecture is an open framework that allows customers to evolve their data center infrastructures for maximum performance, flexibility, and investment protection. As data centers become increasingly virtualized, Brocade’s DCF architecture and products will deliver integrated server-to-storage management to better support and manage virtual servers and applications for improved performance and uptime.

"Brocade’s reputation as a leader in enterprise data centers is built on our track record of providing high performance, flexible, and intelligent infrastructure for today’s, and tomorrow’s demanding business applications," said Tom Buiocchi, Brocade Vice President, Worldwide Marketing. "Brocade-engineered innovation and reliability are now extended from the data center network to server platforms for better end-to-end manageability, virtual mobility, security and performance in the data center."

New Brocade Fabric Switches
The newest Brocade switches offer unmatched 8 Gbit/sec performance, doubling the throughput of previous products while also increasing power efficiency by approximately 40 percent. The Brocade 300 Entry-Level Switch scales from 8 to 24 ports, the Brocade 5100 Switch from 24 to 48 ports, and the Brocade 5300 Enterprise Switch ranges from 48 to 80 ports. All of the new 8 Gbit/sec switches help to protect and extend existing customer investments, as they are backward compatible with the large installed base of Brocade 1, 2 and 4 Gbit/sec SAN devices, including classic McDATA technology and products. The new fabric switches are available now from Brocade, IBM and Sun Microsystems, and are expected to be available from all Brocade OEM partners in Brocade’s fiscal Q3.

New Brocade HBAs
Brocade’s newest HBAs are designed to meet the growing performance, connectivity, and virtualization needs of enterprise data centers. The HBAs are architected to extend I/O performance at the server up to an industry-best 500,000 IOPs (Input/Output Operations Per Second) per port, an important factor in highly virtualized environments. They are also designed to support new Quality of Service (QoS), data mobility, and data encryption features that ensure faster and more secure communications between virtual servers and storage. In addition, Brocade is delivering a new, unified management tool that spans its new switches and HBAs to help customers simplify the management of their data center infrastructure. The new Brocade HBAs are expected to be generally available in June.

Brocade OEM Partner/Reseller Quotes

Dell — "Dell is committed to providing customers optimized storage solutions for fast-growing virtualization environments," said Praveen Asthana, Director of Enterprise Storage & Networking for Dell. "We’re pleased to offer Brocade technologies that deliver advanced networking services with a performance level that better enables more dynamic virtualization solutions."

EMC — "Next generation data center requirements are driving the need for increased performance levels," said Barbara Robidoux, Vice President, EMC Storage Product Marketing. "We will be able to extend 8Gbps performance from the EMC Connectrix ED-DCX-B backbone so that customers will have the necessary performance and scalability to address their future data center network needs."

Engenio — "When it comes to SAN solutions, the strategic partnership between LSI and Brocade spans the product lifecycle from development to delivery," said Phil Bullinger, executive vice president, Engenio Storage Group, LSI. "We will certify Brocade’s 8Gb/s Fibre Channel switch and HBA products with LSI’s family of Fibre Channel storage systems to enable customers to utilize these next generation solutions for increasingly demanding applications and virtual environments."

HP — "Customers with virtualized data centers will improve performance and management of their Storage Area Networks by teaming HP disk arrays with Brocade’s new family of switches," said Kyle Fitze, director of marketing, SAN StorageWorks, HP. "Brocade’s 8Gbps switch enhance HP’s SAN connectivity solutions to deliver unparalleled performance for even the most demanding storage environments by simplifying installation, management and storage provisioning."

Hitachi Data Systems — "As data and information growth continues to escalate, data center managers must ensure that their infrastructures can support the resulting performance, scalability and reliability demands on their storage environments," said Peter Smails, senior director, global product marketing, Hitachi Data Systems. "The advanced external storage virtualization capabilities of the Hitachi Universal Storage Platform V and Universal Storage Platform VM coupled with the new Brocade 8Gbps switch provide the performance and scalability that customers are demanding to manage this growth and give customers the ability to maximize their existing investments."

IBM — "Our customers are demanding increased performance and technology that is ‘future proof’," said Robert Mahoney, IBM Business Line Executive, Storage Networking. "Brocade 8 Gbps switches offer the scalability, manageability, and performance that will enable customers to seamlessly incorporate new technology as it becomes available."

NetApp — "As server virtualization drives new requirements in the data center, we see real value in these high performance solutions from Brocade," said Patrick Rogers, vice president of Solutions Marketing for NetApp. "Customers demand solutions that help them unify and transform their data centers. NetApp unified storage solutions, alongside Brocade 8Gbps switches, help do that and are a welcome addition for customers looking to consolidate end-to-end data center management, from servers to storage."

Sun –"We’re working closely with Brocade to integrate their 8Gb switches into Sun’s industry-leading storage portfolio that will allow customers to fully leverage server virtualization, data mobility and other next generation capabilities," said Jason Schaffer, senior director of storage marketing, Sun Microsystems, Inc.