A new series of data-backup and disaster-recovery appliances has been unveiled by a company this week. The appliances combine a server, hard-drive cache, tape library, and the Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM) software application in a turnkey solution.
According to Kevin Hoffman, vice president of sales at Hoffman Technologies, this product brings an enterprise-level storage solution with full TSM support to smaller businesses. He mentioned that most smaller customers are not interested in TSM due to the high cost of integrating necessary server, tape, and software, which typically amounts to about $50,000. However, Hoffman expects customers’ perceptions to change with this fully integrated solution.
The latest family of appliances incorporates a Sony tape library using AIT drive technology, marking the company’s first aimed at small businesses, said Ellen Rome, vice president of channel sales and marketing at StorServer.
The Y-series solution consists of a 4U rack-mount server with hard-disk-based storage and a 2U Sony AIT tape library, as explained by John Sorensen, vice president of manufacturing at StorServer. Customers need to do a full backup to the appliance upon installation, with TSM providing for incremental changes to be backed up to disk first and then to tape.
For small business clients interested in implementing a disaster recovery program, the Y-series is worth considering, according to Hoffman. He highlighted the Disaster Recovery Manager feature of TSM, which writes a disaster-recovery plan for customers.
The Y-series appliances are available at different price points and capacities, catering to various needs. StorServer currently sells its products exclusively through solution providers and is actively recruiting more partners who can sell the turnkey solution.
Implementation is currently done by StorServer, but the company plans to certify partners who undergo training and have previous certification for TSM.