Features - Storage Innovations:

QLogic 'FIBRE DOWN' INTEGRATED IN HP ProLiant BLADE SERVERS

QLogic Corp, the company that powers storage networks, has announced that QLogic technology is being used in HP's highly integrated Fibre architecture, helping enable robust heterogeneous storage area network (SAN) support on HP ProLiant BL p-Class blade servers. The advanced architecture features "Fibre Down," the integration of single-chip Fibre Channel host bus adapters onto blade servers. Designed to enable the deployment of blade server farms in data centers, this innovative technology dramatically increases the storage expansion capabilities of blade servers by providing very reliable, high bandwidth, long distance connectivity to Fibre Channel SANs.

"Early blade servers supported edge-of-the-network applications such as Web serving, media streaming, load balancing, caching, and firewall protection," said Frank Berry, vice president of marketing, QLogic Corp. "Now with powerful processors and connectivity to Fibre Channel SANs, new HP ProLiant BL p-Class blade servers are equipped to support core business applications in the data center."

"As the clear industry leader in the blade server market and SANs, HP is proud of this latest innovation with QLogic to bring SAN connectivity to our HP ProLiant blade server family," said James Mouton, vice president, Platforms, HP Industry Standard Servers. "HP's modular blade architecture offers customers the ability to integrate Fibre for an extremely cost-effective, elegant solution to the ongoing storage challenge they face. Now, HP ProLiant blade servers can easily access hundreds of terabytes of critical data on the SAN."

The Blade Server Revolution

The Internet has changed the server usage model from single servers to higher density server farms. However, system administrators find deployment and operation difficult. Server resilience and complex cabling are serious problems for server farms. There are also problems associated with securing and managing large numbers of servers.

Blade servers address server farm issues by stacking independent servers within a single cabinet. Each blade is an independent system with its own memory, processor and network connection. Multiple blade servers can be placed in a single rack or enclosure. IDC predicts that the blade server market will reach $3.7 billion by 2006.

Blade Server Infrastructure Powered by QLogic

QLogic offers a family of single chip products that form a complete I/O infrastructure for dense blade servers. Single chip HBAs, switches and management controllers from QLogic provide fast, reliable and scalable storage expansion in an ultra-compact form-factor.

About QLogic

QLogic Corporation simplifies the process of networking storage for OEMs, resellers and system integrators with the only end-to-end infrastructure in the industry, consisting of award-winning controller chips, host bus adapters, network switches and management software to move data from the storage device through the fabric to the server. QLogic designs and produces solutions based on all storage network technologies including SCSI, iSCSI, InfiniBand and Fibre Channel. A member of the S&P 500 Index, QLogic was recently ranked number 25 on Forbes' Best 200 Small Companies and was named to Fortune's 100 Fastest Growing Companies list for the third consecutive year.

Contact: Frank Calderoni of QLogic Corp, 949-389-6120, investor.relations@qlogic.com.