IP Storage Coast-to-Coast

Nishan Systems Inc. will announce on Monday that it has completed the first U.S. coast-to-coast IP storage test.

As Byte and Switch reported last month (see Nishan Talks Some Trash), Nishan is hoping the demonstration will boost its profile among the major players in this market. It is being joined in the demonstration by industry heavyweights IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM), Dell Computer Corp. (Nasdaq: DELL), Hitachi Data Systems

, Intel Corp. (Nasdaq: INTC), QLogic Corp. (Nasdaq: QLGC), and Qwest Communications International Corp. (NYSE: Q).

Dubbed the "Promontory Project" after the area where America's first transcontinental railroad was joined, the trial is said to break all previous distance records for the transfer of storage-specific data over IP.

This makes the demonstration significant, as there has been much talk in the industry over whether IP storage (particularly iSCSI) can handle these kinds of long distances (see IP Storage Test Draws Crowd).

We have proven it can,” says Gary Orenstein, director of marketing at Nishan. Multiple gigabytes of video files and back-up data were transferred at 2.5 Gbit/s over Qwest's dedicated fiber links, joining co-location centers in New Jersey and Sunnyvale, California.Sources agree this is not as challenging as sending data over public lines, but nevertheless, it exceeds the distances for IP SANs so far.

According to Nishan, the project also showcased iSSCI technology working on a real network. Nishan says that to carry the demo's traffic, its IPS 3000 series storage switches were linked to switches from Cisco Systems Inc. (Nasdaq: CSCO) and Ciena Corp. (Nasdaq: CIEN) on Qwest’s nationwide IP network. Adaptec Inc. (Nasdaq: ADPT), Intel and Qlogic provided iSCSI server connectivity, Dell strumped up servers and storage devices, Veritas Software Corp. (Nasdaq: VRTS) provided back-up software, and IBM and HDS contributed Fibre Channel and IP storage gear.

"When planning for global deployments of storage systems, organizations need to trust that products from multiple IP storage vendors will work together,” says Greg Lang, VP and general manager of Intel's networking group. “The success of this first coast-to-coast transmission of I/O block data using Gigabit Ethernet and iSCSI over IP Networks shows the gains made by vendors in the area of interoperability.".

The network will continue to run for several weeks, while Nishan invites other storage players to take part. Still, it should be kept in mind that Nishan is not the only one building long distance IP SANs. Compaq claims it has built the world’s largest multi-vendor storage area network (SAN) by linking three separate SANs on three continents -- Australia, America and Europe -- and has done so using a combination of fibre and IP technology. (see Compaq Road Tests Global SAN).

— Jo Maitland, Senior Editor, Byte and Switch http://www.byteandswitch.com