Cluster Computing:

SANBOLIC ANNOUNCES AN ADVANCED CFS, MELIO FILE SYSTEM 1.5

Sanbolic, a developer of an advanced clustered file system and disk management software for networked storage and a Microsoft Certified Partner, announced availability of Melio File System 1.5. This new release of Sanbolic’s advanced clustered file system adds support for Windows iSCSI initiators, Windows 2003 and Windows XP Service Pack 2, and full support for Windows server authentication and file and directory permissions.

Melio 1.5 adds several key features that further enhance its utility in building highly scalable and flexible Windows applications utilizing SAN storage. Melio has already demonstrated more than a gigabyte per second throughput to a five-server cluster, and the new release further improves performance across a range of I/O types. It is also transparently supports Microsoft’s security enhancements on Windows XP service pack 2, as well as domain authentication and file-level access control lists (ACLs). Advertisement

Melio FS presents a single shared file system across all servers attached to the storage in a SAN. All servers sharing Melio FS in a server cluster have simultaneous access to shared files and are easily managed as a single, highly available, scalable system. This greatly simplifies the access to and administration of data and storage and improves computing resource flexibility. It also allows many applications to be scaled modularly by adding additional industry standard servers clustered into the common file system.

For example, multiple Windows Storage Server 2003 NAS heads can be clustered into a single file system on a SAN, providing a high performance NAS solution that can easily be expanded by adding NAS heads.

Windows iSCSI initiators are also now supported on Melio File System, as well as on LaScala, Sanbolic’s SAN-aware clustered volume manager. This allows customers to build SANs on existing network infrastructure without incurring the cost of dedicated fibre channel network hardware. Sanbolic’s products facilitate the adoption of SANs in SMB and departmental applications by enabling all servers to share a single file system and easily manage the storage volumes on the underlying disk arrays. This eliminates the complexities of managing multiple file systems and LUNs that has been one barrier to SAN adoption in these customers.

Using Melio FS, customers can access shared files from any server on the SAN using a mix of both iSCSI and fibre channel connections, based on performance requirements and availability of network infrastructure. "Customer flexibility in choosing Fibre channel, iSCSI, or NAS access to shared data will be important in extending the SAN to departmental environments. The new release of Melio demonstrates our commitment as a Microsoft Certified Partner to enabling our mutual customers to utilize Windows platforms for large, highly available enterprise data center applications as well as advanced High Definition Video and imaging applications," said Chris Hurley, Vice President of Sales at Sanbolic.