OmegaFi Selects EMC VNX Over NetApp

EMC Corporation announced that Omega Financial, Inc. (OmegaFi), a provider of online
financial, fundraising and communications solutions, as well as consulting and
staffing support to thousands of college fraternities and sororities across the
U.S., has selected EMC VNX unified storage over NetApp.

As a result, the VNX increased OmegaFi’s performance by 10X and enabled
improvements to the scalability and data availability of its Citrix XenServer
virtualized web servers, Microsoft SQL Server databases and other applications.
Customer-driven innovations like VNX have led customers to recognize EMC as the
#1 storage choice for Microsoft, Oracle, virtual desktops and other
mission-critical environments in a recent survey by IDC.

Customer Benefits:

• 
  Performance: Since implementing VNX, OmegaFi has achieved a 10X increase in the
  performance for its end users.

• Scalability: As OmegaFi continues to grow, its VNX can scale to meet the needs
  of the growing business without compromising performance.
  
  Management: VNX’s ease of use and Unisphere management software allows OmegaFi
  to provision new storage in just minutes and view its performance.
  
  Data Protection: VNX’s replication solutions deliver data protection
  and DR to OmegaFi.

Customer Challenges and
Solution:
OmegaFi recently expanded its business model to include in-house
data storage for the national organizations it serves. As a result, the
increase in member records required increased performance, scalability and business
continuity. It’s previous infrastructure, based on standalone file and Web
servers, was not meeting its growing needs.

OmegaFi selected VNX unified storage with EMC replication
technologies over NetApp for its performance, scalability and DR capabilities.
VNX provided a way for OmegaFi to consolidate its file
and application data. EMC RecoverPoint software, part of the Remote Protection
Suite, protects OmegaFi’s physical and virtualized file and block data with
continuous replication from one VNX in a primary data center to a second VNX at
a recovery site 110 miles away.

OmegaFi relies on Citrix XenServer to virtualize its Windows file
servers on the VNX, as well as 25 virtual machines running Red Hat Linux and
SQL Server applications supported by the VNX. With VNX’s unified
capabilities, It has consolidated its file and block data onto the VNX,
simplifying management, reducing operational costs and enabling future growth.

George Elliston, Network Administrator, OmegaFi, said: "When
looking for a new storage solution, we compared the EMC VNX and NetApp
offerings box to box. VNX was definitely in a different league than NetApp as
far as its simplicity, efficiency, performance and ability to scale with our
data growth. Service was also a strong consideration for us. EMC support is as
reliable as it comes."

"Because VNX and
Unisphere software make system administration so easy, we’re able to respond
very quickly and efficiently to needs of the business. We can provision new
storage in just minutes, maintain the system or achieve an instant view of how
the entire environment is performing. The VNX, with Unisphere practically
manages itself."

"With the VNX, once
everything was set up I realized that I didn’t have to think about it, which
has really increased my productivity. There’s no real hands-on management to
speak of. I now have much more time to spend on virtualization projects and
other more strategic work. I don’t know how I managed before without it."

"Our users say that
everything runs 10X faster on the VNX than it did with our previous storage
solution. We have several executives who work remotely and pull files across
the network, and they have been raving about how much faster the performance
has been since we implemented VNX."

"With the growth we’ve
been experiencing, the VNX allows us to scale easily and increase capacity
whenever needed without worrying about decreasing system performance."

"It’s incredible how fast
VNX and RecoverPoint are at moving enormous amounts of data. We once restored
two 60-70 gigabyte databases to a test server in just five minutes. The VNX
just works. It has proven to be more beneficial and reliable than any solution
I’ve ever used. I love that we have both our file and block storage
consolidated on the VNX. It’s simple to manage and grow."