San Diego’s Overland Storage
Overland SRM 3 is now for sale through Overland’s resellers. The software
Monday updated its storage resource management software
with features to make it more effective and help enterprises save more
money.
Storage Resource Manager (SRM) 3 will allow IT staffs to tackles such
projects as SAN/NAS planning, disaster recovery, server consolidations and
cutting storage backup time and budget.
Overland SRM 3 features intelligent actions for all major operating systems
to give organizations the ability to identify storage problems and take
corrective action. Previous agents would run file scans in these operating
systems, but not perform intelligent actions.
Overland SRM 3 includes application agents for Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server,
and Microsoft Exchange that provide information
about capacity and allows the IT staffer to set policies that warn users
before they run out of disk space. Overland SRM 3, which installs in less
than an hour, also gives the administrator tighter controls to automatically
run external scripts and move files to less expensive storage alternatives.
Enterprise Storage Group Senior Analyst Nancy Marrone praised the product
enhancements, noting SRM 3 did more than just report information about the
storage assets, but actually took action based on the information gathered.
Marrone said the
smart automation will help customers streamline storage processes.
As important as storage resource management is to companies handling various
amounts of critical data, it is just as important for storage software
vendors to offer some sort of SRM product to compete in what is sure to be a
lucrative, multi-billion dollar market, according to research firms such as
IDC and Yankee Group. Why is this?
Storage infrastructures are becoming increasingly complex and large
companies are using disparate storage techniques, including NAS
as fiber channel and iSCSI
aggregating this distributed picture through a single console, which can be
used by IT administrators, IT managers and even executives. This
centralization can allow the IT department to focus on more important
issues, such as capacity planning and disaster recovery strategies.
Most of the major systems vendors, including IBM, HP, and Sun feature some
degree of SRM, and it is common for these firms to buy whole firms such as
Overland Storage to compete if they feel they are lacking. For example, Sun
bought
SRM provider HighGround Systems in December 2000, which was one of the
larger SRM providers at the time.
2002 was a major year for SRM pickups, through acquisitions of entire firms
or product lines. In August, IBM Tivoli bought SRM
startup TrelliSoft for an undisclosed amount. EMC swallowed Prisa
Networks for $20 million in September, repackaging Prisa’s storage
network management tool for its midrange customers. Veritas purchased
NTP Software’s storage resource management division in November.
costs $20,000 per terabyte and can be purchased in increments of 100
gigabytes. Overland Application Agents for Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, and
Microsoft Exchange are sold separately for $10,000.
Users activate Overland SRM via an electronic license key that allows them
to regularly expand the product’s capabilities to keep pace with growth.
Overland Storage Refreshes Storage Resource Manager
