[TriLUG] ISCSI SAN

[Matt Nash]

Matt Pusateri wrote:
> Hello Triluger's,
>
>
> I've been tasked with finding our company a SAN.  Currently we've
> looked at EMC & Lefthandnetworks.  Were leaning towards ISCSI,
> corporate is a complete Windows shop, but we here in Raleigh are
> almost completely Linux.  So I need to find something that plays nice.
>  I thought about using openfiler(iscsi-target) and rolling my own, but
> I don't think corporate will buy into it.  Anyone have any
> suggestions/comments?  Direct experience comments appreciated, as
> opposed to why don't you just use "Samba" comments :) Also if anyone
> has a contact at Netapp let me know, I plan to look at them as well.
>
> Thanks
>
> Matt P.
>
>   
The company I work for bought 3 Left Hand units in January, and so far 
they have worked fine without a hitch.  Even MS plays well with them!  
My understanding from the installing technician is that the boxes 
themselves are off-the-shelf servers running a specialized Linux OS.  
The management console is multiplatform, written in Java, and is very 
straightforward and easy to understand.

I haven't tried mounting one of the iSCSI targets on a Linux machine, 
but that is an experiment I have planned for when I have run out of work 
to do.

Left Hand's technology is pretty interesting, and should be more easily 
scaled than EMC.  Not to mention MUCH MUCH cheaper.