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Features in this issue

• ASK THE EXPERT: What does storage pooling mean? What do you think of it?

  by  Joel Lovell

• Vixel chip brings switching to disks

  Subsystem vendors are coming up against the limitations of shared protocols.

• Test before you taste

  by  Benjamin Kuo

  If you're putting a SAN together, you'll need to test interoperability. Surprisingly, that goes double for open systems products. Some companies are even doing it themselves - here's how

• Bona fide iSCSI products ship

  With ratification of the standard coming soon, more and more iSCSI products have started surfacing.

• Distance yourself from disaster

  by  Charles T. Clark

  Long-distance replication is reachable with new optical and IP storage networking technologies.

• Apple Xserve counts on ATA

  Apple has embraced ATA drives in its new 1U rackmount server.

• NDMP restores sanity to NAS backup

  by  David Braue

  NDMP has emerged as the best way to provide plug-and-play connectivity between backup software and filer-attached tape drives.

• 15K RPM disk drives

  Need speed? While not spilling over with capacity, 15,000 rpm disk drives deliver average seek times for reads at about 3.5 ms vs. around 4.5 ms for 10,000 rpm drives.

• NAS: more than just an appliance

  by  Randy Kerns

  New advances in NAS boxes are moving them from mere departmental storage workhorses to servicing mission critical corporate applications.