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ESG Lab has performed multiple hands-on tests of the HP StorageWorks XP series of disk arrays, including a test of the XP12000 in 2006. The focus of testing was on performance, scalability high availability and disaster recovery, ESG Analysts have also written on the Disaster Proof capabilities of the HP XP series. Initial tests paid special attention to external storage virtualization capability. At the time, the notion of an Enterprise-class storage system that supported external storage virtualization was unique—a notion which persists to this day—and yet the value of such a system is obvious and compelling. ESG defines virtualization as the logical view and control of physical infrastructure with the goal of greater optimization, utilization and simplification. Therefore, external storage virtualization provides a logical view and control of heterogeneous storage systems. The industry has done a great job creating a partial network in which host systems share storage system resources. However, the storage systems themselves share no communication with one another. Aside from being on the same network, these storage systems do not interact with each other in any way. They are discrete and isolated devices that are networked to host systems, but not to each other. In reality, network storage systems are not fully networked. They do not work in concert, but rather separately, individually, discretely and therefore, inefficiently. External storage virtualization networks your networked storage. It provides value from host system to storage system and storage system to storage system. The power of external storage virtualization is that it reinvents storage networking while minimizing disruption. For years, we have discussed the notion of a fluid data center and virtualization is the liquid within this construct. ESG was impressed with HP's XP Disk Array external storage virtualization capability and observed it grow from a handful of early adopters to hundreds and now thousands of users. It is a brilliant strategy, leveraging a leading, field-proven Enterprise-class storage system that supports mission-critical environments; with all of its intelligence, software and reliability being leveraged to extend these capabilities to heterogeneous systems. It enables end-users to acquire the HP storage system (which is budgeted for) and also implement storage virtualization (which may not have any allocated budget) within the same system. Internal Storage Virtualization ESG is a major proponent of storage virtualization. In fact, we believe that the more highly virtualized a storage system is, the more overall value it brings. Since its inception, the main focus of the HP XP24000 has been on external storage virtualization. The new XP24000 goes the next step by adding compelling and valuable internal storage virtualization. Internal Storage Virtualization comes in different forms and capabilities within a storage system. For example, the ability to abstract all of the disks in large logical pools is a core storage virtualization technology that provides significant value. Logical storage pools make it easier to manage and provision your disk capacity. Additionally, it can provide a huge performance boost by striping data across dozens, hundreds or more drives, making all of the disk actuators work in concert to perform read/write operations. Another valuable internal storage virtualization technology is thin provisioning. This allows for greater capacity utilization, brings more applications online without having to buy capacity in advance and simplifies the storage provisioning management process. The XP24000 supports large logical pools and thin provisioning. ESG believes that these two capabilities are powerful forms of internal storage virtualization that raise the value of a storage system. Storage administrators have told ESG time and again that the management of individual storage systems is one of their biggest challenges. Cumbersome tasks such as storage provisioning and performance tuning consume too much time and too many resources. Storage systems that provide internal virtualization technologies significantly reduce complexity and enable more fully optimized systems without constant tuning and manual management.
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