HP Makes Entry-Level Storage Work Harder

HP today refreshed its entry-level storage offerings, boosting data protection and availability while keeping prices competitive.

The HP StorageWorks 2000 Modular Smart Array (MSA2000) Fibre Channel and iSCSI systems were designed with virtualized server environments in mind.

Pricing for the single- and dual-controller storage systems runs from $5,000 to $8,500 without hard drives. A half-dozen SATAor SAS drives would add $3,000 to $6,000 to the cost, HP estimates, depending on whether users want low-cost capacity (SATA), higher-cost performance (SAS), or a combination of both. The arrays can scale up to 36 terabytes and support either 4Gb Fibre Channel or 1Gb iSCSI host connectivity.

For those prices, users get the option of dual controllers, dual power supplies and RAID-6 for better availability and protection, which HP MSA product manager Charles Vallhonrat said will help the company better compete against the likes of the Dell-EMC AX4.

HP claims a 21 percent share of the entry-level external storage market, which was $2.8 billion and growing in 2006, according to IDC. Dell was second at 15 percent, IBM third with a 9 percent share, and Sun fourth at 5 percent, according to IDC’s Disk Systems Tracker. EMC, HDS and NetApp barely registered, with market share around 1 percent or less. IBM and Dell gained a couple points of market share last year, while Sun and HP lost share.

HP says the MSA2000 arrays are aimed at SMBs looking for an easily deployed SAN for physical or virtual server environments, and can also be used for remote office, departmental and secondary and tertiary storage needs of enterprises.

The MSA2000 also includes optional management software for “snap and clone” replication capabilities. The arrays also complement the HP BladeSystem, with a built-in management console to set up and configure storage.

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