Buyer’s guide compares and rates 130 midrange arrays

May 11, 2010 – Analyst firm DCIG recently released its 2010 Midrange Array Buyer’s Guide, which provides details and comparisons on more than 130 disk arrays from 30 vendors.

Each entry includes data on about 30 disk array/controller/software features, and includes weighted, relative scores and rankings for each array.

The buyer’s guide was compiled by DCIG founding analyst Jerome Wendt, with help from some IT end users.

I like Jerome’s content because, before becoming a storage analyst and writer, he was an IT professional – most recently spending five years at First Data Corp. as a senior storage engineer. As such, he brings an end user’s perspective to all of his content.

As he says in his intro: “I wanted to leverage my experiences at First Data so the Buyer’s Guide could alleviate one of the most time-consuming components of the midrange array buying decision – the information gathering and evaluation stage.”

The buyer’s guide is designed primarily for IT professionals that want to cut down on the time spent evaluating midrange arrays before they arrive at a short list that they can test in-house with specific applications. But array vendors might also be interested in the guide in order to make competitive comparisons. Likewise VARs and other channel professionals.

You can also use the report to come up with stats such as:

-56% of midrange arrays support thin provisioning
-Less than 10% of midrange arrays support deduplication of primary storage
-Less than 30% of the arrays support MAID technology

You can get more info on the Midrange Array Buyer’s Guide on the DCIG Web site.
(Pricing starts at $5,000.)