SGI InfiniteStorage 4600

A powerful new RAID storage system from SGI will help organizations meet the escalating bandwidth and I/O
demands of today’s performance-driven applications. The
SGI InfiniteStorage 4600 augments the InfiniteStorage product line,
extending its ability to provide leading-edge data management solutions
to scientific, engineering and high-performance business environments.

The SGI InfiniteStorage 4600 is targeted at data-intensive applications, high I/O
workloads, and large-scale consolidation. The new system answers the
escalating data management needs of today’s workflows with the
flexibility to combine an array of network interfaces and disk drives
in a single system.

The company’s flagship RAID
system, the SGI InfiniteStorage 4600, deploys seventh-generation
technology within a proven solution architecture built on more than 25
years of industry-leading high-performance storage expertise. SGI
combines that expertise with the company’s unique ability to seamlessly
integrate the InfiniteStorage 4600 solution into any high-performance
computing (HPC) or high-performance business (HPB) environment, while providing the agility to support hybrid computing workflows.

"Constantly growing data sets, the increasing demands placed on
storage systems by complex applications, consolidation, virtualization,
and the simple need to add capacity — all these factors have made
storage requirements a constantly moving target," said Raj Das, vice
president of storage, SGI. "Today’s performance organizations require a
flexible storage solution, one that cost-effectively delivers leading
performance and scales to fit workflow demands. As the flagship RAID
system in the SGI storage portfolio, the InfiniteStorage 4600 meets
those criteria today, while providing plenty of headroom for growth in
the future."

Industry-Leading Performance, Capacity and Flexibility
The new InfiniteStorage 4600 system’s industry-leading throughput and I/O
performance make it an ideal solution for earth and life sciences,
engineering and manufacturing, defense and intelligence applications,
and digital asset management environments.

The InfiniteStorage 4600 initially will feature 16 redundant
4Gb/second Fibre Channel drive channels, double the data transfer rate
of the SGI InfiniteStorage 4500, to deliver up to 6,000 sustained MB/second of host-side bandwidth. A range of applications also can exploit the system’s blistering I/O
performance, designed to reach 175,000 sustained IOPS (Input/Output
Operations per Second). Subsequent releases will also feature support
for 8Gb/second Fibre Channel and both DDR and QDR InfiniBand
connectivity.

The SGI InfiniteStorage 4600 matches this performance advantage with
superior configuration flexibility. The new system can scale to support
256 Fibre Channel or SATA drives at initial release. With high-density SATA drives, one system can support 256TB of raw storage capacity. However, by mixing drives, customers can achieve a tiered storage environment to accommodate RAID block storage, high-capacity environments, consolidation and virtualization initiatives, and a range of data management needs.

The InfiniteStorage 4600 also offers a wide choice of RAID
levels (1, 3, 5, 6, and 10) to allow administrators to choose the
protection/performance combination that best fits their environment.
Fully redundant I/O paths,
automated failover and online administration create "always-on"
availability to ensure that data remains accessible in the event of
possible failures.

"For those users operating at the leading edge of demand for IOPS
and bandwidth, this new offering from SGI has the potential to let them
sleep a little easier, knowing that they’ll have sufficient ‘balanced
brute force’ to deal with the intense and complex demands of their
applications – and that it’s from a supplier that truly understands
those demands," said Mark Peters, analyst, Enterprise Strategy Group.
"The packaging of multi-dimensional scalability means that performance,
capacity, and throughput can be thoroughly well provisioned. What is
likely to make the product more attractive are other attributes less
traditionally associated with HPC,
such as storage tiering, investment protection, and the ‘always on’
data availability. Just because users operate at the edge of computing
possibilities does not mean that they do not need, or value, basic
business attributes just as much as any enterprise user."

At the North German Supercomputing Alliance (HLRN), SGI
InfiniteStorage 4600 arrays will constitute the vast majority of a 2.3
Petabyte storage solution to support HLRN’s new supercomputer, a
25,000-core SGI Altix ICE and SGI Altix XE system. Shared by two German HPC
sites — the Konrad-Zuse-Zentrum für Informationstechnik in Berlin (ZIB)
and the Regionales Rechenzentrum für Niedersachsen in Hannover (RRZN) —
the combined supercomputer and storage will be connected via a rapid
data line called HLRN Link.

"The SGI InfiniteStorage 4600 system is an essential component of this HLRN supercomputing installation," said Prof.
Alexander Reinefeld at ZIB. "This powerful new platform will support
scientific research aimed at solving some of history’s most difficult
and taxing computational and data problems, and will provide our
administrators with the flexibility to match our capacity to our
workflows."

"When working with complex supercomputing applications and data
sets, our users need to rely on a data management infrastructure that
provides not just performance, but genuine reliability and
availability," said Prof. Gabriele von
Voigt at RRZN. "SGI provides that, both through the InfiniteStorage
4600 platform and through the deployment and support expertise of its
Professional Services organization."

Advanced Storage Administration Environment
The new system also comes with the latest release of SGI
InfiniteStorage System Manager software, which customers can use to
configure and administer the InfiniteStorage 4600 system.
InfiniteStorage System Manager allows IT
administrators to cost-effectively get the most from their storage
investment via a common intuitive user interface through which they can
manage all SGI storage systems.

With InfiniteStorage System Manager software, users have continuous
access to data even during system configuration, reconfiguration,
expansion and maintenance. Organizations can better protect their data
by proactively monitoring drive health, and enhanced replication
capabilities — from more mirrors to a larger number of snapshots per
volume — ensure valuable data remains intact.

The new environment also supports up to 512 partitions and 2,048
Fibre Channel log-ins, making the InfiniteStorage 4600 ideal for
large-scale consolidations and data virtualization. Other features,
including increased queue depth and support for volumes greater than 2TB, ensure that the system keeps pace with the most demanding HPC and enterprise applications.

Integrated Solutions from SGI
The SGI InfiniteStorage 4600 is a standards-based system that can
easily be integrated with SGI Altix, SGI Altix XE and SGI® Altix ICE
servers. In fact, the SGI Global Professional Services organization is
known in the industry for its rapid deployments of large-scale storage
solutions in an array of environments, from stand-alone storage
installations to tightly integrated storage-and-server deployments
designed for specific high-performance workflows.

Pricing and Availability
The SGI InfiniteStorage 4600 is available today from SGI or one of its value-added resellers, and is priced from $175,000 USLP.

SGI