Promise vs Active?

[gsprague]

We have never used Xsan before and our main purpose for storage is straight file sharing and web data with the ability to expand. There will be no video editing or anything to intensive.

We are looking to buy a Promise Xsan setup with 2 SANlinks and 2 Mac Minis. One of my sales reps also recommends Active Storage. Does anyone recommend one over the other, Promise vs Active or maybe something else?

Thank you!

[abstractrude]

if your not doing video or really large files im not sure xsan is for you. there are a number of expanding filesystems that will work as well. isilon is a nice solution, probably less of a pain than xsan.
anyway active over promise big time.

[mark raudonis]

+1 for Active. We've had tons of their stuff spinning in our racks for over three years now. No problems.

Mark

[bs3375]

When there is a website called promisesucks.com I would think twice.

But in all seriousness, the x10 had a lot of problems. I've yet to lay my hands on a x30.

I've replaced a lot of x10s with Active and Infortrend. They are both pretty predictable and reliable now. If you're looking for someone to shadow you and work with you on your installation then Active. If your looking to lower costs and are pretty savvy with the mechanics of a FC RAID, the Infortrend might be a good fit.

As far as using mini's... in my opinion you'd be better off running a single StorNext metadata controller. Don't get me wrong, the mini's work. I have deployments with them for certain. But StorNext on a x86 processor running a Linux kernel doesn't keep me up at night (if you know what I mean).

[JSamuel]

+1 for Actives.

-1 on Xsan, doesn't seem like you really need it here.

[matx]

I just set up a new Xsan set up with one Mac Mini Server (10.8 server) using the Promise SANLink adapter. The other controller was a Mac Pro tower, only because that's what they had available. It could have been easily two Mac Mini Servers. Works well. Xsan in 10.8 is a no brainer.

The storage was Promise in this case, because that's what they had in their previous Xsan 1 set up.

Active Storage is nice kit too. Blinky light good.

Infortrend is solid, but not fun to configure and set up. LOL.

I've also set up Rorke Galaxy Aurora with StorNext and HyperFS.

It all depends on who is going to set it up, look after it , help you out.

So many options.

[morphenine]

i would highly recommend you not go with Xsan for you needs. If its nothing intensive, you just want a large amount of storage, go with a NAS solution. You can get a Synology loaded down with 24TB for less than $10k, and its idiot proof. For an Xsan setup you're looking at easily double or triple the cost for the same capacity. Xsan is really for people who need high performance storage for things like video. If thats not you, then you probably don't want it.

[gsprague]

Wow, thanks for all of the replies. OK, so it seems like I don't really need an Xsan setup for standard file sharing.

This probably isn't the place to ask but what does everyone recommend for affordable/reliable/easy setup/expandable storage NAS that works well with OS X Server?

Morphenine, thank you for the Synology recommendation!

[matx]

I set up a Mac Mini Server with THREE Promise Pegasus RAIDs attached. 30TB of usable storage for under $10K.

It runs Mac OS X Server. I like that. It does stuff. Works well.

On the small NAS appliance scene, I've never used Synology, but I've worked some nice setups from QNAP. One company had 8 of them in production!

[bs3375]

Qnap has been good to us, though not too scalable. I also like rolling my own with Open-e and a good SuperMicro chassis.

http://www.open-e.com
http://www.supermicro.com/products/nfo/Xeon_X9_E5.cfm?pg=SS&show=SELECT&type=SSG