LeftHand Networks' next generation SANs provide superior data availability, scalable performance, and a best-in-class storage management feature set. We can provide these features at an affordable price point because, unlike legacy storage systems, our iSCSI SANs are built upon a distributed clustered architecture.
The essential building block of a LeftHand SAN is the storage node: a compact, high availability server that contains its own processing power, RAM, cache, disk drives, and bandwidth.
LeftHand SAN/iQ® software clusters storage nodes together, aggregating all of these resources into a single, larger storage system. Each SAN/iQ cluster responds to a single IP address, and every storage node in that cluster participates equally in sharing both the workload and the capacity of the whole cluster.
You manage a single storage system while resizing volumes, taking snapshots, making remote copies, taking storage nodes down for upgrades or maintenance, and even scaling the SAN - all without taking the system offline or affecting data availability. And, because our storage nodes each have their own controllers, adding more of them to a cluster increases performance and redundancy along with storage capacity, eliminating the performance bottlenecks associated with legacy SAN technologies.
Open iSCSI SANs
An iSCSI SAN can be composed of a single cluster of storage nodes, or multiple clusters in different locations. Because LeftHand SANs are open, they can be composed of clusters containing different drive technologies (SAS or SATA) and different physical hardware platforms (NSM, HP or IBM). You don't get locked into a proprietary architecture. You can even integrate a virtual storage network, comprised of VMware® ESX servers using LeftHand's Virtual Storage Appliance (VSA). All managed together in the same SAN from a single pane of glass.
Enterprise Class Features
Award-winning SAN/iQ software is at the heart of every LeftHand SAN, delivering this comprehensive, fully integrated feature set:
- Centralized Management Console: Single pane of glass for all storage modules
- Thin Provisioning & Auto-Grow: Save space by allowing volumes to grow on an as-needed basis
- Snapshot: Take snapshots that can be mounted as volumes or cloned
- Multi-Site SAN: Integrated synchronous replication technology
- Remote Copy: Integrated asynchronous replication with bandwidth throttling
- Volume Migration: Data stays online while you migrate volumes between clusters
LeftHand's enterprise-class features, open architecture, and affordable price points provide you with flexibility and choice in your storage network.