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SASSY MOVES

From STORAGE Magazine Vol 7, Issue 7 - October 2007

AMCC has unveiled its new SAS technology - a market it was convinced it would never enter - and expects it to cement its position as a leading storage player. Brian Wall reports

"Way back, we sat in a room with a limited amount of money and vowed we would never enter the SAS market. We didn't have the resource to do so at the time. Now things are different."

So says Scott Cleland, director of marketing for AMCC Storage. And how different things truly are. The 'room' has become a global reach and the company one of the major players in the storage marketplace - with SAS a key part of its burgeoning portfolio.

In fact, AMCC has just unveiled its 3Ware 9690SA Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) RAID controller - and that comes hard on the heels of an announcement from analyst firm Gartner, naming AMCC's 3ware storage business unit as the channel unit market share leader in SATA hardware RAID controllers for the second consecutive year in 2006.

The Gartner Dataquest's study by Roger Cox, 'Market Share: Host Bus RAID Controllers, Worldwide, 2006', also reports that, since 2004, 3ware has grown its host bus SATA RAID controller unit market share almost twofold. And, according to the report, 3ware outpaced its nearest competitor in 2006 by more than 45,000 units in the distribution sales channel.

"We reinforce our steadfast commitment to the channel everyday by proactively addressing its needs," states Cleland. "3ware SATA controllers are the number one choice in the channel for customers looking for performance, fault tolerance, data protection and value. AMCC is single-minded in our mission to provide RAID expertise and revolutionary 3ware RAID storage products through the channel to an ever growing customer base."

Cleland proudly points to the way that AMCC "pioneered the way for SATA and we now capitalise on our time-proven serial storage expertise to take users from SCSI to SAS".

What AMCC says it is bringing to users with the 9690SA is superior hardware RAID performance and reliability. "Most importantly, whether our customers require SAS, SATA or SAS/SATA connectivity, 3ware will provide the right tool for the job."

The 3ware 9690SA offers configuration flexibility, with three PCI Express low-profile controller choices: eight internal ports, eight external ports and four internal/four external ports. The message is that organisations can broaden their horizons with SAS connectivity, expandability, data protection and performance. "As SATA and SAS technologies converge," adds AMCC, "users look to 3ware SATA for price and performance and to SAS for SAS/SATA connectivity, with expansion up to 128 devices. The 3ware 9690SA delivers accelerated SAS performance and the flexibility of internal and external connectivity."

AMCC now has a highly scalable 3ware serial storage product portfolio that includes 2- to 24-ports of SATA connectivity and maximised SAS expandability to up to 128 devices per controller. The SAS controllers include AMCC's unified RAID management interface and software suite, so users get, "a simplified configuration experience with every 3ware controller, irrespective of its storage interface", says AMCC.

PARTNERS ALIGN
Meanwhile Emulex has partnered with AMCC to provide a key SAS building block for the 9690SA. "Delivering SAS-based products is a critical part of Emulex's overall strategy to provide customers with a comprehensive embedded product portfolio," says Bob Whitson, senior vice president and general manager, embedded storage products, Emulex Corporation. "The 3ware 9690SA is a high performance platform that utilises the new Emulex IOC 500S SAS I/O controller to deliver the data integrity and expandability capabilities that enterprise-class storage systems demand."

At the same time, Joel Hagberg, vice president, marketing and business development, Fujitsu Computer Products of America, has welcomed the expansion of the 3ware product line to include the new SAS drive interface technology.

"The 3ware 9690SA SAS RAID controller perfectly compliments Fujitsu's SAS and SATA drives," he states. "Now, with both SATA and SAS controllers, 3ware offers the broadest choice when it comes to hardware-based, high-performance, scalable RAID storage."

The significance of AMCC's move is not lost either on AIC/Xtore, the designer and manufacturer of rack-mount server and data storage enclosure solutions and one of the forerunners in providing SATA and SAS solutions.

"3ware controllers have a long history of providing high-performance, high-capacity RAID for data-intensive environments," comments Gene Lee, vice president. "AIC/Xtore is pleased to partner with AMCC in this significant product introduction and we look forward to employing the 3ware 9690SA to deliver a comprehensive SAS product portfolio for our customers' most mission-critical applications." ST

The three 3ware 9690SA controller kits, which include cables, are currently available through AMCC's worldwide network of distributors, integrators and VARs. ST