Regarding the items you indicated are important to you:
Multiprotocol NFS/CIFS: both Compaq and NetApp serve data to both NFS and CIFS clients Capacity: Compaq currently scales to 1TB raw capacity (that is approx. 800GB usable, accounting for parity disks, hot spare and minimal SnapShot overhead); that is less than 1/4 of current NetApp single head unit capacity; however, Compaq does use 1" 18GB disks (granted they are SCSI), so with 14 per shelf you do get some density gains with less overhead in the same physical space (i.e. 18GB parity and hot spare overhead vs. 36GB each for NetApp) Uptime: Compaq's N2400 is a first-generation product with a limited track record, therefore difficult to predict; NetApp has maintained documented 99.99x% availability Reboot time: Compaq claims a Rapid Reboot functionality; since they basically run a tuned Windows 2000 OS (as opposed to NetApp's built-from-the-ground-up single purpose microkernal OS), I'm curious how the get around fsck and what, if any, penalty is incurred SnapShot mirror: this is really two issues 1. Snapshots: Compaq integrates their SANworks Virtual Replicator (SWVR) software in the N2400; this provides a different implementation of snapshots from NetApp; basically, once a snapshot has been taken of a volume, the next time any data block in that volume is changed the SWVR delays the write until a copy is made of the original data (subsequent changes continue with no delay); obviously, you take a write performance hit 2. Mirroring: I'm not entirely sure, but I'm not aware of an asynchronous remote mirroring product from Compaq SANworks; their Data Replication Manager supports mirroring across a long-wave FC connection (up to 100 km if implemented correctly), but this is very different from the capability to replicate across the WAN, while minimizing impact on bandwidth as with NetApp's SnapMirror
Other items to consider: - Compaq's implementation uses RAID 5; this is an issue when it comes to volume expansion; the SWVR software allows online expansion by creating new RAID groups and concatenating them to existing storage "pools," in which case you use the additional disk space only once you've filled the original volume (no gain in spindle density); to expand an existing RAID set, you have to reformat, rebuild and restore from tape; RAID 4 is much more administrator-friendly. - If you have a Compaq SAN, then future upgrades to the Compaq NAS line will allow you to connect to the SAN (for centralized backup without clogging up the production network, for example)
FWIW, pricing is roughly comparable b/w Compaq's N2400 and an F740 (Compaq may be a touch cheaper). If you add in things like SnapMirror or SnapManager for Exchange, then NetApp gets a lot more expensive, but then you can't get equivalent functionality of those products in a Compaq solution.
HTH. Joe
Joe Luchtenberg Dataline, Inc. New number and email, please update: 757.858.0600 858.0606 fax joe.luchtenberg@data-line.com
-----Original Message----- From: Langborg Tom [SMTP:Tom.Langborg@smhi.se] Sent: Monday, October 02, 2000 9:58 AM To: 'toasters@mathworks.com' Subject: Netapp vs Compaq TaskSmart
Hi I am a old netapp admin. I am wonder if there is someone how can help me with argument to choice netapp instead off compaqs tasksmart server. From my point it looks that the tasksmart version 2.0 witch should come next year should work well. We should have this server to access both nfs and cifs. Most off the client are pc but the major files traffics are in nfs. The volumes are for start 500gb to over 1 Tb next year. What about uptime? reboot time? snapshot mirror?
/Tom Langborg