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SAN Applications

NEED

Companies in many industries are now required by both regulatory and business needs to implement a plan for disaster recovery and business continuance. These plans call for data replication of critical information across a geographically dispersed storage area network (san). In addition to being used for disaster recovery, these san networks are also used to replicate data allowing for local copies at distributed locations for performance reasons and for databases in which data is geographically diverse (different data stored at different locations). Data replication requires a transport system that can handle large amounts of data. For that reason, having fiber between data centers is the ideal solution, especially in cases of extended distance between sites. In the event that fiber is not available, a high speed sonet/sdh line will provide a good alternative.

CHALLENGES

Cost effective connectivity of data centers over fiber or a leased circuit presents a few challenges. Although there are several storage extension options available, in today’s economy, the challenge lies in choosing a solution that will:

  • Leverage existing infrastructure to the greatest extent possible
  • Have the ability to transport other enterprise protocols, such as Gigabit Ethernet in addition to SAN traffic
  • Provide connectivity over SONET and SDH lines when fiber is unavailable
  • Adapt to any topology (point-to-point and ring)
  • Scale up to accommodate traffic growth with ease
  • Decrease the initial cost of deploying both equipment and fiber infrastructure
  • Decrease ongoing cost of space and power typically necessary to deploy fiber connectivity between geographically diverse sites.

EKINOPS SOLUTIONS

Ekinops’ Storage Area solutions offer a number of advantages over standard SAN solutions offered by transport vendors. In addition to providing the most commonly used standard SAN Service types and rates (Fiber Channel 1G, 2G, 4G, and 10G) today, Ekinops leverages the market unique capabilities provided by the Ekinops 360 Multi-Protocol, Multi-Reach, Next Generation Transport System to provide differentiating advantages to service providers.
Amongst these values are the following:

  • Legacy infrastructure interoperability allowing for SAN services to be transported not only over WDM wavelengths, but also over existing SONET/SDH/Gigabit Ethernet transport infrastructure and in some cases even legacy SONET/SDH ADM infrastructure
  • Ring based Add Drop Multiplexing of SAN services allowing for a wavelength to be shared across multiple sites rather than requiring a dedicated wavelength to each site
  • The Ekinops DynaMux capability (Dynamic Multiplexing) allowing for efficient multiplexing of any protocol mix over a wavelength or any service type
  • Single fiber transport capability for fiber constrained environments or environments where fiber is expensive or being leased
  • “Hut Skipping” capability allowing for transport of SAN services up to 300km in a single hop without the use of inline amplifiers allowing for the elimination of expensive amplifier space and the cost of ongoing environmental control of those sites
  • Fiber Channel Encryption adhering to Encryption Standards required by most Governments.


Fiber Channel is the predominant protocol utilized for SAN networks today. However, many enterprises are moving to Ethernet (either Fiber Channel over Ethernet or storage replication utilizing TCP/IP). Because of this trend, all Ekinops SAN products provide for user programmable selection of Ethernet or Fiber Channel protocols. This protects the end users investment by allowing the SAN deployments of today to be converted to Ethernet without the need for a software or hardware upgrade. Data replication over Fiber using WDM

 

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BENEFITS

  • Redundant, Scalable System
  • Wide Selection of SAN Service Types
  • Carrier Grade Reliability and Resiliency
  • Interoperability with Legacy Transport and standard SONET/SDH networks
  • FIPS certified encryption option
  • ADM Capability for 1G Fiber Channel
  • Efficient Wavelength multiplexing of 1G SAN services and SAN services mixed with other service types (Video, SONET/SDH, Ethernet)
  • Lower Cost of Infrastructure using the Ekinops Single Fiber and Hut Skipping Capabilities

LINKS TO RELATED PRODUCTS

PM1008
PM1005
PM253
PM254