LSI today introduced the LSI Engenio 4900 storage system, a next-generation midrange disk storage system designed to deliver optimized performance, dynamic flexibility and advanced functionality at an affordable price. With 8Gb/s Fibre Channel (8GFC) and 1Gb/s iSCSI host interfaces, the system's multi-protocol connectivity and modular architecture help lower acquisition and operational costs while addressing the requirements of server and storage consolidation.

"In today's challenging economic environment, IT organizations face the difficult task of controlling costs while still accommodating rapid data growth. The key to facing this task is to deploy storage solutions that boost efficiency and performance without requiring major infrastructure upgrades," said Richard Villars, vice president of Storage and IT Executive Strategies at IDC. "Storage solutions based on products like LSI's Engenio 4900 will make it easier for enterprises to address changing storage requirements without busting their IT budget."

The Engenio 4900 system's next-generation architecture delivers 1.6GB/s on sustained reads from disk, a 60 percent improvement in bandwidth performance compared to its predecessor. The system also delivers over 50,000 IOPS (input/output operations per second) disk reads, a 25 percent improvement compared to the previous generation. By utilizing the system's 8GFC host interfaces, users can reduce the number of host bus adapters (HBAs) per server and the number of overall ports in the FC SAN infrastructure while achieving comparable performance. This can result in up to a 45 percent savings in SAN infrastructure costs through fewer hardware components. It also eliminates the need to make trade-offs between system performance and server I/O slot conservation. Operational cost savings also are enabled through infrastructure simplification.

Based on extensive interoperability testing, the system is designed to seamlessly integrate into an existing 2GFC or 4GFC infrastructure. This helps to protect current IT investments while establishing a foundation for the future upgrade to 8GFC SAN environments. In addition, the ability to intermix FC and iSCSI host interfaces can result in as much as a 57 percent savings in infrastructure costs by allowing less performance-sensitive applications to run on servers utilizing lower-cost iSCSI interfaces.

"Faced with relentless data growth and shrinking budgets, companies continue to look for ways to reduce storage costs through improved resource utilization and efficiencies," said Phil Bullinger, executive vice president and general manager, Engenio Storage Group, LSI. "The Engenio 4900 provides customers with a highly adaptable, cost-effective solution that delivers the balanced performance necessary to tackle the mixed workload demands of virtualization and consolidation environments."

The 4900's modular architecture allows customers to start small and seamlessly grow capacity up to 112 FC or SATA drives, including self-encrypting drives (SEDs). The pay-as-you-grow scalability combined with the ability to intermix up to sixteen FC, SATA or SEDs in a single drive enclosure keeps initial costs low and enables tiered storage for optimized performance and reliability, reduced rack space, and lower power and cooling costs.

Engineered to ensure continuous access to data, the 4900 includes redundant components, automated path failover and extensive online administration and maintenance capabilities. Advanced data protection also is provided with support for SEDs utilizing LSI SafeStore Encryption Services. LSI SafeStore Encryption Services help to secure a drive's data from unauthorized access or modification resulting from theft, loss or repurposing with minimal cost and complexity.

The LSI Engenio 4900 is immediately available to OEM customers.