Is EMC Celera really that bad ?

I would not necessarily assume that you should buy Celerra just because
everything else you buy is EMC. There are advantages to being a single
vendor shop, but you should require EMC to tell you what they would be.
Besides any technical advantages of EMC NAS over other vendors' NAS,
what benefits do I get by staying single vendor?

Then ask the other vendors the opposite of that. Why should I abandon
being a single vendor shop and do my NAS with you? Give me technical
and non-technical reasons why.

I would also recommend using a third-party company to help guide an
RFI/RFP process, as their expertise will help you wade through the BS.
Yes, I work for such a company, but I've always felt that way. The
typical method of just comparing each vendor's claims (without any
independent source of info) is fraught with problems.

There are advantages and disadvantages to being a single- and
multi-vendor shop. You just have to pick which ones you like.

---
W. Curtis Preston
Backup Blog @ www.backupcentral.com
VP Data Protection, GlassHouse Technologies

-----Original Message-----
From:
] On Behalf Of
Nicholas Buckley
Sent: Tuesday, January 29, 2008 11:42 AM
To:
Subject: [C.A.S.] Is EMC Celera really that bad ?

Hi all,

Not looking to provoke a row here, just looking for objective answers.

NetApp has a lengthy and mostly positive track record when it comes to
NAS -
no real debate there ( or is there ? )

Just because EMC are associated traditionally with high-end SAN, does
that
mean that, almost by definition, their offerings in other segments are
bound
to be some way off the pace of the "market leaders" - whoever they may
be ?

We're a large-ish DMX / Clariion estate (SAN) and are looking to evolve
our
file/print from a server-based to a NAS-based architecture.

If you were me, given that we're an EMC shop, wouldn't you be minded to
look
first at Celera and ( if pushed ) then look to see what the other major
players offered as opposed to merely going with the "received wisdom".

The can of worms is hereby opened.

Best wishes to everyone,

Nick,
Cardiff,
UK





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