Storage Management Strategies for the CIO
Product reliability
With many enterprise array purchases carrying six- or seven-digit price tags, the tipping point for an investment of that size is likely to pivot on how reliably the product performs over a period of time. Here, too, enterprise storage vendors can pat themselves on the back a little, as the product reliability category netted the highest average score among the five rating categories. Four of the six products in the current survey turned in their best scores in this category, with Hitachi beating all comers with a very solid 6.85 rating. EMC (6.78) and IBM (6.72) had their best category results for product reliability and finished second and third, respectively. Hewlett-Packard (HP) Co. also netted its best point total, finishing with a 6.57 that placed it fifth in this strong field.
PRODUCT RELIABILITY
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Enlarge PRODUCT RELIABILITY diagram.
Hitachi earned high scores for four of the five statements in this category and missed snagging the fifth by a mere 0.03 points. The true test of reliability is uninterrupted service, and all products in this survey were rated at 6.50 or better for the critical statement "This product experiences very little down time." Hitachi and EMC share the top spot for that statement, both within a hairsbreadth of 7.00 with identical 6.97 scores.
Meeting expectations is also a key gauge of reliability. Again, all six products came through with scores of 6.50 or higher for "The product meets my service-level requirement," highlighted by Hitachi's 6.98 and EMC's nearly as dazzling 6.96.
This was first published in March 2011
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