Chelsio Touts 10GigE iSCSI Initiator

SUNNYVALE, Calif. -- Chelsio Communications Inc., a leading provider of 10 Gigabit Ethernet unified wire solutions, announced that its S310/320 Storage Accelerators are the first in the industry to support 10GbE iSCSI Initiator functionality. This solution is extremely cost-effective since it provides complete high-performance SAN connectivity within a 10 Gigabit server adapter capable of performing storage, data, and cluster networking simultaneously.

Chelsio also announced the 10G iSCSI-FC Gateway, a feature-rich solution specifically designed for cost-effective storage consolidation and high-performance iSCSI links to enterprise Storage Area Networks (SANs). Designed to connect IP-based servers to shared Fibre Channel (FC) storage networks, the 10G iSCSI-FC Gateway enables organizations to quickly and cost-effectively extend the benefits of SANs -- including improved backup, high availability, and storage asset utilization -- across a wider range of servers and applications.

High-Performance IP SAN Connectivity Using Chelsio S310/S320

The Chelsio S310/320 adapters provide access to a 10GbE iSCSI SAN without sacrificing server performance. Interrupts, CPU utilization, memory bus utilization and host bus access associated with iSCSI and TCP/IP are significantly reduced by offloading these functions onto the S310/320 adapter. In addition, all the functionality is supported using the standard 1500 byte Ethernet frames, thus enabling full routing of the traffic.

The S310/320 adapters also support hardware iSCSI digest implementation, which ensures data integrity over a layer 3 TCP network without burdening the host CPU. Server CPU utilization testing for typical application profiles and current servers demonstrates that Chelsio iSCSI adapters deliver more than twice the throughput improvement over a software initiator using Layer 2 NIC implementation using standard Ethernet frames.Servers equipped with Chelsios S310/320 adapters are now able to connect to SANs with complete iSCSI functionality. The S310/320 adapters eliminate the high up-front acquisition costs of adding storage networking to a server by allowing IT professionals to avoid having to purchase a server with a separate adapter pre-installed. In the past, IT professionals had to purchase separate adapters to perform simultaneous data, storage, and cluster networking functions versus purchasing a server equipped with a S310/320 adapter, designed to provide three functions in a single network device.

“This is yet another example of how Chelsio’s T3 unified wire engine technology delivers state-of-the-art functionality to the 10 Gigabit Ethernet network, enabling true unified networking on a single fabric,” said Kianoosh Naghshineh, president and CEO of Chelsio Communications. “Our 10GbE Storage Accelerators now deliver features that were previously only achievable with expensive, single purpose Fibre Channel equipment. Our unified wire customers can now run their Fibre Channel applications on the same server concurrently with their networking and clustering applications, at no additional premium.”

Chelsio Communications Inc.