HEI Releases Integrated Storage and Virtualization Solutions

HEI Systems & Solutions announced the release of two new products this week targeted at small to mid-sized businesses looking to leverage advanced virtualization solutions at an affordable price. HEI’s Z2 Systems line includes the R3000 Storage Server and the R3000x Integrated Storage and Virtualization Server.

R3000x Integrated Storage and Virtualization Server

“Larger companies have seen significant savings in their technology costs and realized energy savings by implementing virtualization platforms. However, the up-front capital investment to build a robust storage area network to effectively support a scalable virtualization infrastructure has made the barrier of entry too costly for medium to smaller businesses,” said Matthew Beebe, General Manager and Corporate Vice President.

“As IT budgets start to feel the impact of a slowing economy, more and more customers are looking to suppliers to introduce innovative ideas and solutions. Our products provide a cost saving alternative to large, enterprise level solutions without compromising performance or expandability,” added the HEI executive.

The R3000 is a one rack unit (1U) storage server with 3 terabytes of redundant enterprise class storage. Included with the Storage Server is HEI developed software integrated with Citrix XenServer to provide configurable snap-shotting, on-disk cloning and roll-back of individual virtual machines, in addition to other virtual machine management and automation capabilities. By providing an orchestration layer between the storage and the virtualization components, the Z2 solution enables organizations of all sizes to implement enterprise level system management and disaster recovery solutions without significant capital investment and ongoing operational costs. The R3000 is capable of expanding up to 96 terabytes using a mixture of Enterprise SATA or SAS hard drives, and is available with redundant, energy efficient power supplies.

The R3000x system is built upon the Supermicro 1U Twin ‘twin server’ architecture that includes a similar storage platform as in the R3000 and an additional dedicated server in the same 1U chassis, providing a platform for virtualization with dual quad-core Intel Xeon CPUs and 16GB of RAM (up to 48GB available). The unique architecture includes a dedicated 10 Gigabit/s Ethernet storage network between the two nodes, providing high-speed and secure data access. “The R3000x includes the same advanced storage management software solution included in the R3000, but directly couples it with an instant out of the box virtualization package,” explained Beebe.

In general, the Z2 Systems are priced at about 10-25 percent of the cost compared to larger enterprise class storage platforms, but provide the same advanced features required to effectively host a reliable and supportable virtualization infrastructure. The R3000 has a manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $5,650 for the basic storage server, and the R3000x is priced at $6,449 with the integrated virtualization platform.