I need a SAN. Fortunately, I don't need that much of a SAN - really, 2TB of disk should be plenty, but I need it to be kinda fast, since it will be the back end for a small VMware installation. (Right now, I've got about twenty VMs using six SATA disks of local storage. They're not even especially fast disks, just random 7.2Krpm drives from Newegg. It works, but when the spammers show up and slam the mail queue, the disks spin a lot and things get a bit slow.)
I'd like something like a PowerVault, but that's relatively expensive for my small outfit. Openfiler looks like it would work nicely, however. The software is free-as-in-beer, and the hardware should be fairly cheap (relatively speaking). I should be able to build the hardware, including a dozen or so spindles of fast-enough disk, for around $8000. Compared to the cost of even a low-end Dell or EMC SAN, it looks really promising. The one issue is support. I probably could get by, but I like to plan ahead for when I get hit by a bus. How good is their support, and how good a job would they do if my boss (a relatively non-technical person) got on the phone with them? David Smith MVN.net
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