This week’s News Bits we look at a number of small announcements, small in terms of the content not the impact they have. Cavium’s QLogic FC and Ethernet technologies are now available on HPE Synergy Composable Infrastructure blade server platform. Stratoscale acquires Tesora and releases new services. Rubrik updates its Cloud Data Management platform. Cisco now offers the Microsoft Azure Stack on UCS. Seagate releases special edition Halo Wars 2 game drive. Cloudtenna announces a partnership with both Nutanix and NetApp. And NetApp states that they will be bringing an HCI to market through its SolidFire investment.
This week’s News Bits we look at a number of small announcements, small in terms of the content not the impact they have. Cavium’s QLogic FC and Ethernet technologies are now available on HPE Synergy Composable Infrastructure blade server platform. Stratoscale acquires Tesora and releases new services. Rubrik updates its Cloud Data Management platform. Cisco now offers the Microsoft Azure Stack on UCS. Seagate releases special edition Halo Wars 2 game drive. Cloudtenna announces a partnership with both Nutanix and NetApp. And NetApp states that they will be bringing an HCI to market through its SolidFire investment.
Cavium’s QLogic FC & Ethernet Technologies Now Available On HPE Synergy Composable Infrastructure Platform
Cavium has announced its portfolio of QLogic FastLinQ Ethernet and Fibre Channel technology is now available on Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) Synergy Composable Infrastructure blade server platform. The new technology includes:
- The HPE Synergy 2820C 10Gb Converged Network Adapter is a key element in HPE Composable fabric connecting pools of compute resources to networks with reliable, high-performing converged 10Gbps Ethernet connectivity. With Flex-10 Technology, it converges Ethernet and FCoE onto a single connection simplifying hardware and reducing costs. Concurrent with storage I/O functionality this adapter also enables single root I/O virtualization (SR-IOV) capabilities for networking functions.
- The HPE Synergy 3820C 10/20Gb Converged Network Adapter is another key element in HPE Composable fabric connecting pools of compute resources to networks with reliable, high-performing converged 10Gb or 20Gb Ethernet connectivity. With Flex-20 Technology, the Synergy 3820C converges Ethernet, iSCSI and FCoE onto a single connection, simplifying hardware management and reducing costs by up to 60%. The Synergy 3820C is an ideal choice for any virtualized or converged data center.
- Designed for the HPE Synergy Composable fabric, HPE Synergy 3830C 16Gb Fibre Channel Host Bus Adapter connects Synergy compute resource pools to SANs over 16Gb native Fibre Channel (FC) fabrics. It provides high-performance connectivity to HPE Synergy Virtual Connect FC Modules and Brocade FC Switch Modules. The Synergy 3830C supports advanced virtualization, security, port isolation, dynamic power management and low CPU utilization features. QLogic StorFusion technology built in the Synergy 3830C integrates with Brocade Gen 5 16Gb FC fabrics enabling rapid deployment and orchestration, advanced diagnostic and improved reliability and resiliency for HPE Synergy frames connecting to shared SAN storage. Doubling[2] the I/O performance of 8Gb FC HBAs, the Synergy 3830C is ideal for FC storage intensive workloads.
- Cavium QLogic 57840S ASIC LOM on the HPE Synergy Composer modules which utilizes the QLogic NIC partitioning (NPAR) technology to virtualize the physical connections within the HPE Synergy Composer which in turn delivers the necessary scalability and flexibility required to build the composable infrastructure.
Stratoscale Acquires Tesora & Releases Relational Database To Accelerate Cloud Services
Stratoscale has announced that it has acquired the Database-As-A-Service (DBaaS) provider Tesora. Tesora’s platform complements the services provided by Stratoscale and will help their customers as they move into the cloud. Stratoscale is also announcing its new relational database service that is fully-managed and AWS-compatible. The new service features single-click deployment and seamless scalability.
Rubrik Announces 3.1 Update Of Its Cloud Data Management Platform
Rubrik announced the latest update to its Cloud Data Management Platform, version 3.1. Customers will still be able to reap the economic benefits of the cloud while also leveraging analytics and enhanced security. New capabilities include:
- Physical Windows Server – Rubrik continues to rapidly expand support for the platforms enterprises rely on most. For physical Windows Servers, customers can now leverage policy-driven, incremental forever data management, while providing global predictive search for instant access to file versions across clouds. This adds to previously released support for physical environments including SQL databases, Linux, and NAS.
- Rubrik Envision – Rubrik Envision delivers instant, actionable insights enabling customers to manage data at cloud scale. Customers can easily create, customize, and share rich reports for platform analytics around data management, compliance, and capacity utilization.
- End-to-end Software Encryption – Rubrik bolsters its security capabilities by adding software-based encryption for Rubrik appliances. This updates adds to the previously released hardware-based encryption. Enterprises can now secure both data and management planes via data encryption (hardware and software-based) and role-based access control.
Cisco Offers Microsoft Azure Stack On UCS
Cisco announced an expansion to its Unified Computing System (UCS) solutions with an integration of Microsoft Azure Stack. This allows UCS customers to deliver Azure services from their on-premises data centers.
Key benefits include:
- Accelerated growth and innovation for enterprise customers and service providers looking to grow their businesses quickly with an efficient and flexible cloud consumption model. Service providers can deliver Azure infrastructure as-a-service (Iaas) and platform-as-a-service (Paas).
- Builds on the industry leading fabric-based UCS architecture featuring high-performance networking with the versatile Cisco Virtual Interface Card optimized for Azure Stack.
- Simplified management and control that provides a single pane of glass for managing all elements of compute and networking through policy-based templates, reducing the total cost of ownership for joint customers.
- Increased confidence and trust in the IT environment supported by Cisco and Microsoft — proven innovators and market leaders in hybrid cloud infrastructures.
Seagate Releases Special Edition Halo Wars 2 Game Drive
A re-skinned Seagate Game Drive for Xbox, the Halo Wars 2 edition comes with 2TB of capacity and an image of Atriox on the front. Much like the Gears of War 4 drive, the new drive comes with all of the same benefits of the standard Game Drive with a skin for the diehard fans. The drive is expected to be available this month for a MSRP of $99.99.
Cloudtenna Announces Partnership With Nutanix & NetApp
Cloudtenna has announced partnerships with both Nutanix and NetApp. With Nutanix, users can now leverage Cloudtenna’s DirectShare to take their on-prem Acropolis File Services (AFS) to the cloud. NetApp has also made Cloudtenna part of its Alliance Program.
Benefits of DirectShare with Nutanix and NetApp:
- Enable employees to access behind-the-firewall filers from cloud SaaS applications like Microsoft Office Online.
- Allow employees to remotely access behind-the-firewall filers from iPhone, Android, and web.
- Enable employees to securely share files and folders with external partners and clients.
- Stop the leak of files to consumer cloud services.
- Send large files fast, with no file size limits: Up to 10x faster than traditional FTP.
- Intelligently search and audit your file services with Cloudtenna’s added machine learning intelligence.
- Enable intelligent, Google-like search through millions of enterprise files, behind the firewall, to find the best matches for individual users
NetApp States There Will Be A Future SolidFire HCI Product
During its third quarter conference call, NetApp let it slip that they would be bringing a next-generation hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) solution to market based on their SolidFire investments. The HCI market is rapidly expanding and it seems like NetApp is a bit late to the party. To make up for tardiness, the company claims that they will be doing something a little different such as offering the first fully cloud-integrated HCI solution and the ability to run multiple workloads without compromising performance, scale or efficiency. Waiting a bit may pay off for NetApp, as they can see the issues or missing features from the current generation of HCI solutions and make improvements.
