IBM United States Hardware Announcement 116-076

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demands, organizations need to deploy infrastructure that can deliver greater

consistency, predictability, and performance. Legacy infrastructures, however,

were not designed to support the performance requirements of evolving workloads

and flash-based storage technology. In fact, an aging network will impede the

performance of an all-flash data center.

A new approach to storage networking is needed to enable databases, virtual

servers, desktops, and critical applications, and to unlock the full capabilities

of flash. By treating the network as a strategic part of a storage environment,

organizations can maximize their productivity and efficiency as they rapidly scale

their environments.

IBM Storage Networking SAN256B-6 director with Fabric Vision technology

combines innovative hardware, software, and built-in instrumentation to ensure

the industry's highest level of operational stability while redefining application

performance. SAN256B-6 delivers a modular building block for increased scalability

to accommodate growth for large-scale enterprise infrastructures.

Fabric Vision technology enhances visibility into the health of storage environments,

delivering greater control and insight to quickly identify problems and achieve

critical service level agreements (SLAs). Breakthrough 32/128 Gbps performance

shatters application performance barriers and enables support for more than 1

billion IOPSÂ for flash-based storage workloads. With diverse deployment options,

organizations can smoothly adapt and optimize their businesses to meet next-

generation storage requirements.

Key prerequisites

The IBM Storage Networking b-type SAN switch and director family supports Fibre

Channel connectivity for servers and storage. IBM Storage Networking SAN256B-6

(8961-F04) supports all features and functions listed and require Fabric OS level

8.0.1, or later.

For a list of supported servers and storage systems, refer to the Hardware

requirements section.

Planned availability date

November 11, 2016

Description

IBM Storage Networking SAN256B-6 director with Fabric Vision technology combines

innovative hardware, software, and built-in instrumentation to ensure high levels of

operational stability while redefining application performance. SAN256B-6 delivers

a modular building block for increased scalability to accommodate growth for large-

scale enterprise infrastructures.

Fabric Vision technology enhances visibility into the health of storage environments,

delivering greater control and insight to quickly identify problems and achieve

critical SLAs. Breakthrough 32/128 Gbps performance shatters application

performance barriers and delivers support for more than one billion IOPSÂ for

flash-based storage workloads. With diverse deployment options, organizations can

seamlessly adapt and optimize their businesses to meet next-generation storage

requirements.

Purpose-built for enterprise deployments

Designed to meet relentless growth and mission-critical application demands,

SAN256B-6 director is an ideal platform for midsized networks that require

increased capacity, greater throughput, and higher levels of resiliency.