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I have just heard a TERRIBLE rumor about Active Storage
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We installed an mRaid at the end of last year. I’m really hoping Quantum buys their tech and continues to develop the product line. It would be hard to trust any company associated with Alex Grossman again if they totally abandon their old customers, so it should be worth it to Quantum.
Even if they don’t, I’m counting on the system lasting 3+ years. That was the whole point of buying the best system in the first place… once it’s up it should just work for a long time.
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Brendan, there is not really much tech to pick up.
AS was a “bundler”, the RAID controllers/firmware was done by a company in Taiwan – Accusys – and the ‘server’ was Lunux + Stornext.
The only real IP they had was the new mPath HW and SW.The same went for Apple – no ‘storage wizardry’ there – the controllers were made by Areca, a Taiwanese company, and they were not ‘enterprise’ by any stretch with no write cache mirroring.
You may have been better off with a company that owned all their own IP and had been around for more than three years, like Promise…
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We have a VTrak/Xserve combo that’s worked great for years. The idea of installing a new xsan based on a Mac Pro taking up 1/3 of a rack or even a Mini in a Sonnet rack kit wasn’t very attractive.
I’ll give the old Active team a few more weeks to come up with a plan for their old customers. They seemed to be a customer focused company, so burning bridges
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Have to disagree that their stuff was slow. It might not have been the fastest but it was proven to be faster than Promise which many people recommend and yes, it was and still is reliable.
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Sorry but their storage was *not* faster than Promise’s – proven by many users that actually followed the published best practices – and their hardware failure rate was far greater than that of Promise and others. And Promise VTrak will work with any OS, not just OS X, right out of the box without tweaks and groans.
I have several friends that ended up with AS due to the cost only and by late last year had the chassis out to scrap and the HDDs re-purposed; AS could not resolve their SAN issues and always responded with “it appears to be something you did on the SAN”.
And they were going to retire the 16-bay unit – when it still has significant bugs that have not been resolved.
To be fair, they were a start-up and everybody has growing pains at that stage and it is too bad they did not have the opportunity to mature… -
You might indeed have more experience than I do, however I do recall reading at least two articles that pitted comparable units of Promise and Active together and Active was better. Putting that all aside, what issues should I be looking out for that your clients had? They had a good reputation from the people I talk to and from me, considering I am a customer. Add to that Bob Zelin’s sound recommendation and they couldn’t be all that bad.
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So what for now? i was just about days to expand my actual AS system but… surely i wont pay for a quantum system and i will not bet for small companies. I guess i will be back to Promise i have an old Vtrak which have worked flawlessly since 5 years ago. About the speed comparison between promise and AS i can say that head to head, my old vtrack is faster than the 16x3GB AS. It was something that i found one day when placing a big cache for transcoding files.
Someone told that AS went to Rorke data im having a look at their Galaxy hardware, it seems like prices are similar.
have anyone worked with Rorke? how about service and customer care?
best
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So:
1. AS was slower, proven by many users, and their hw failure rate was higher (are you talking HDD? controllers? or what?)
2. AS only worked with OS X
3. AS was cheaper than Promise
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4. What were some of the significant unresolved bugs? -
“They had a good reputation from the people I talk to”
I don’t think anybody accused them of having a bad rep; remember, they were a start-up, not-for-profit company, and good customer service – at any cost – was vital to maintain growth.“they couldn’t be all that bad”
From the hardware POV there are only so many ways to store data; the AS controller was made by Accusys and they are nearly identical to the other dozen Taiwan-based companies – but they have really only had that level of RAID controller for a few years as compared to Promise and Infortrend.
You have to consider experience: other companies have years of engineering growth and millions of units shipped, AS could not have had more than a few thousand unit shipped.“AS went to Rorke data”
The Rorke Galaxy line was Infortrend a few years ago and if you look at the box closely (I did at NAB) it is now Promise.1. AS was slower, proven by many users, and their hw failure rate was higher (are you talking HDD? controllers? or what?)
No storage vendor can be responsible for HDD failures other than using a model not suited for the duty (desktop drives in a 24/7 subsystem) or not handling the myriad ways in which drives can hose the controller.
From what I saw and heard from a few re-sellers there were several controller failures that brought down the surviving ‘good’ controller, and even some cases of data loss.
Also stability issues in larger configs where adding or removing a client caused the Xsan to freeze as the LUNs became inaccessible.
I have personally witnessed the AS-to-dumpster process, not kidding.2. AS only worked with OS X
And not perfectly; they appeared to have a problem with SAN state changes where new clients could not see the LUNs until the AS units were rebooted. This was not a switch or client config issue, purely AS controller firmware.3. AS was cheaper than Promise
Not significantly, and many deals were closed by giving huge margins to undercut the competitors to help generate business and ‘buzz’; remember they were a start-up and not-for-profit.
The price was competitive up front but would drop to close the deal – no profit there when you sell below cost.4. What were some of the significant unresolved bugs?
See 1 and 2.It is academic now as they are NLA and there will not be any support available at all.
Bear in mind that all of the shortcomings could have been addressed given time, but that wont happen now… -
In terms of high-performance RAID storage for XSAN, StorNext, etc. I highly recommend Dot Hill. Few have heard of them in this industry, because they’re just entering this channel. But they’ve been one of the bigger OEMs for years, producing storage for some important companies. Their partner list in M&E includes Autodesk, DVS, Harris, HP, SGO (Mistika) & more. They’re engineered in America, they own all their own IP, and the performance is amazing.
Standard disclaimer: I work with Dot Hill as a strategic consultant. I also run my post business on their boxes. They are rock-solid. I wouldn’t work with them if I didn’t believe in their products. So I’m not a shill.
I stumbled upon Dot Hill while looking for a Promise alternative, and haven’t looked back. Its a real pleasure working with an American storage company that is producing class-leading products based on their own engineering, actively listening to the needs of leading post companies. In fact, you’ll find Dot Hill boxes in some of the highest profile post facilities in Hollywood, employed on some of the worlds biggest blockbusters.
I’ll be at their booth at NAB, and would welcome any questions. The boxes don’t look nearly as sexy as Active’s, but they perform like crazy, are price-competitive, and include a very innovative feature set.
Peder Morgenthaler
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