----- Original Message ----- From: "Todd C. Merrill" tmerrill@mathworks.com To: toasters@mathworks.com; emcnas@mathworks.com Sent: Friday, March 23, 2001 3:01 PM Subject: NAS Wars
A recent article in Server/Workstation Expert, entitled "NAS Wars," might be of interest here:
http://swexpert.com/CB/SE.C11.MAR.01.pdf
I applaud Alan's efforts at applying a bit of math and a lot of common sense to such a sticky issue.
I just finished reading it. Not a bad article, really. But I must say it sounds like Alan had a pro-EMC bias. He admits to all the noted discrepancies between the EMC and the NTAP configurations, but he make no attempt to analyze them quantitatively; i.e. doubling the amount of EMC hardware to more realistically compare RAID-0 with RAID-4. He goes so far as to cast unfounded suspicions on Netapp; i.e. "Who knows (I am a suspicious sort), perhaps a scaling problem is why NetApps chose not to use more disks." He then launches into some dubious assumptions and calculations about disk ops to make the IP4700 look better than it performed on the Spec benchmarks, and ends with a completely unfounded "I would expect the IP4700 to have a significant advantage over the NetApps F840 due to what would seem a richer hardware architecture." Well, heck Alan, you would expect that, but you'd be wrong! He only begrudgingly admits that WAFL "may" have something to do with this!
He basically starts off by trying to question the validity of the Paine Webber report, finds difficulty in doing so, and winds up declaring that it's all the fault of lack of further information. (Alan probably thinks, "If I could just get more information, I'm sure I could show that the IP4700 beats the F840 in at least one juryrigged configuration!")
Bruce
PS - And he doesn't even mention cost. What if the F840 is half the price of the IP4700???