Availability of Broadcom Secure and High Density Gen 7 64G FC Director with 256-and 512-Port Brocade X7 Directors

Broadcom Inc. announced the availability of secure and high density Gen 7 64Gb FC Director – the 512-port and 256-port Brocade X7 Directors.

Brocade Gen 7 64G FC Director appliances

The company also announced the Brocade 7850 Extension Switch, an industry’s first 64Gb FC switch, extending SANs over virtually any distance across the globe.

Brocade 7850 Extension Switch

This latest product launch further expands Brocade 64Gb FC portfolio, demonstrating industry innovation and technology leadership. The company also continues to address customer requirements related to data center infrastructure security and resiliency with a cyber-resilient SAN that mitigates cybersecurity and downtime risks.

Brocade Gen 7 FC safeguards high-scale fabrics and enables efficient scalability. The Brocade X7 is the highest-density director for storage, consolidating more device connectivity into a single fabric. It also reduces capital expenses by consuming less rack space, and lowers operational cost by reducing power consumption, cooling, and management. What’s more, Brocade Gen 7 implements many security measures that act autonomously to maintain the highest levels of security and resiliency quickly and efficiently. At the same time, FC’s closed network and point-to-point architecture prevents attackers from being able to see – let alone infiltrate – connected storage devices.

“Deploying a cyber-resilient SAN based on Brocade Gen 7 FC is the most effective way to mitigate the cybersecurity and downtime risks associated with legacy infrastructure,” said Dennis Makishima, VP and GM, Brocade storage networking division, Broadcom. “High density and global network extension technology enables Broadcom customers to build data center infrastructure that is scalable, secure, and reliable.”

This, combined with integrated security, delivers strong line of defense to protect an organization’s valuable data. Here’s how:

• Featuring industry-leading port density, integrated security, and autonomous SAN management technologies, the Brocade X7 Director is purpose built to protect mission-critical data from cybersecurity threats at scale. In addition, the Brocade 7850 Extension Switch extends security over distance to protect critical data being replicated across data centers.

• Brocade Gen 7 is a cyber resilient network built to take the guesswork out of protecting and managing data. With this release, the company has further simplified SAN management and operations at scale. Large-scale IT environments can significantly improve their operational efficiency and ensure reliable security practices and policies, while decreasing the risk of human errors. With automated administrative routines and processes, enterprises reap savings in time otherwise spent maintaining high levels of security, troubleshooting issues, and optimizing application performance.

The company has integrated security and autonomous SAN capabilities that build upon the inherent reliability and availability of FC. Brocade Gen 7 technology provides peace of mind in a world of increasing threats and expands the traditional IT definitions of business continuity and DR.

With integrated security, data center-proven reliability and seamless scalability, the Brocade X7 Director and Brocade 7850 Extension Switch maximize the performance, productivity, and efficiency of enterprise storage investments and resources.

Brocade X7 Director: High-density blade for increased scalability

• To create high-scale fabrics, this director with the new 64-port blade increases the Brocade X7-8 Director capacity up to 512x64G ports in a 14U rack space and the Brocade X7-4 Director up to 256x64G ports in an 8U rack space. This increases the total system bandwidth up to 39.6Tb/s to handle more workloads, making it for large-scale enterprise infrastructures.
• Utilizing SFP-DD transceivers enables 33% more device connectivity in a very dense footprint. This director delivers port density to power large-scale storage environments that require increased capacity, greater throughput, and higher levels of security, resiliency, and operational efficiency.

Brocade 7850 Extension Switch: Cyber-resilient replication connectivity for enterprise storage

• The Brocade 7850 Extension Switch securely moves more data, faster, over WAN connections for continuous data protection. With ample replication performance, up to 100Gb/s over distance, and built-in technology that overcomes the inherent challenges of latency and packet loss over long distance, it provides high-speed connectivity between locations to speed up replication performance – even over intercontinental distances.
• Organizations can now easily move large amounts of data to ensure critical data is available in the event of a disaster. The Brocade 7850 includes a suite of features, from pre-deployment validation to advanced network failure recovery technologies, to protect data from WAN disruptions and outages. Moreover, data-in-flight security, coupled with the Brocade hardware and software robust security features, secures connections between data centers to safeguard data from threats over the WAN and to protect data from unauthorized access.

The high-density Brocade X7 Director and the Brocade 7850 Extension Switch are available. OEM partners will begin shipping throughout the next couple quarters.

Drew Schulke, VP, product management, Dell Technologies, Inc., said: “Dell Technologies’ Connectrix B-Series 64Gb/s FC switches deliver cyber resilient connectivity with the security and performance required by today’s enterprise data centers. Through our longstanding Broadcom collaboration, including validated interoperability with Dell’s industry-leading SAN infrastructure for simplified management, our solutions ensure enterprises can confidently support, scale and increase performance of their most demanding workloads.”

Marcus Schneider, deputy head of global portfolio management platform business, Fujitsu Ltd., said: “The new high-density Brocade Gen 7 Director and Extension Switch help enterprises overcome many of today’s IT challenges. Customers demand solutions that help them manage data growth, secure critical applications, and protect against sophisticated cyber-attacks. Brocade Gen 7 FC SANs combined with Fujitsu PRIMERGY Servers and ETERNUS Storage are among the building blocks that deliver high-performing and reliable IT systems that our customers expect.”

Patrick Osborne, SVP and GM, Storage, HPE, said: “With the rapid proliferation of data, customers need to scale their data storage and management solutions with security, efficiency and resiliency. The new Brocade Gen 7 FC Director and Extension Switch offer exceptional scalability and will allow HPE to continue delivering solutions like HPE GreenLake for Block Storage and the HPE Alletra portfolio that enable operational efficiency and simplified SAN management for our customers.”

Dan McConnell, SVP and product management and enablement CTO, Hitachi Vantara LLC, said: “As generative AI and similar technologies drive exponential growth of data, securing that data across environments has become even more critical. To successfully navigate this challenge, it’s essential to establish a resilient and scalable infrastructure capable of harnessing the data-centric benefits of hybrid cloud. Infrastructure should empower organizations to access data and extract valuable insights faster than ever before. At Hitachi Vantara, we are committed to providing the world’s most powerful storage solutions designed to address the security, scale and performance challenges posed by AI-driven data growth. By combining the advanced capabilities of the Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform with these new cutting-edge Brocade Gen 7 FC products, we can deliver exceptional security and performance for customer data centers embracing a hybrid cloud environment.”