Due to unprecedented pressure by the higher echelons of the Data Storage Community the UD Blog is risen.

It's not that there hasn't been much going on of late, much to the contrary, things have been quite lively to say the least.  During the early months of this year it seems that, for UD at least, spring has definitely sprung. There has been a huge increase in interest in UD and Hive products over the last few weeks and I feel it's only proper that I reciprocate with the odd tit-bit of info every week or so.

 Anyway, to pick up where I last left you all dangling, iSCSI, Mac, Good, Bad or Ugly? Well, to be honest, there have been a few developments (well it has been over a year FFS!) and it seems that with the latest iSCSI initiators available from Atto etc things have improved. Performance was never really the issue when it came to using iSCSI targets on a Mac platform but stability. But it seems that now you can have it all; speed, stability and value for money.

Whereas before the UD iSCSI SuperStar range was predominantly used by the Windows and Linux market, now we are seeing an increase in Mac customers using iSCSI devices such as the SuperStar 4116RM and the new dual controller SuperStar II. They are still mainly implemented as near line storage systems rather than Primary storage devices but that's still great progress.

 "What's next?" I hear you all cry, well, the future is 10Gbit iSCSI (well it's one path to the future at least).  With the cost of 10GigE switches and HBA more than halving over the last 12 months it's a technology well worth keeping an eye on.

"Then what?" you ask, excitedly; only 8Gbs Fibre Channel. The next generation is now available from UD and performance testing can tell us that there is a marked improvement on 4Gbs, to be expected.

 "Is that it then?......" Goodness me!! There's no pleasing some people. Well, apart from vast improvements for iSCSI support on Mac, 8Gbs FC cometh for HyperStars, UD SuperStar and HyperStar systems now being available in Dual Redundant Controller, PCIe (HyperStar 9000) setting the world on fire with its ridiculously fast performance, Kodak doing a great job in a support role and trying to keep up with the phenomenal interest in Hive and all its related side projects, there hasn't been that much going on really.

 That said, I will be expanding on all of these subjects and many more over the next few weeks, months, years.... who knows.