Active Storage 4TB ActiveRAID ES Hard Drive Array

Design

ActiveRAID ES Hardware and RAID Kernel Design

The ActiveRAID ES sets a new standard in low-cost high-performance fault tolerant RAID for Apple IT infrastructures. It was designed for outstanding ease-of-use and deployment while delivering the best price/performance possible in Apple based IT business applications. The ActiveRAID ES shares the same modern design of the original ActiveRAID, offering sophisticated features found on systems costing significantly more, but scaling back the blistering overall throughput and 24/7 365 day non-stop features usually reserved for enterprise and the post-production/broadcast deployments the ActiveRAID excels in.

Like the original ActiveRAID, Active Storage started with a proven storage processor design and enterprise hardened RAID stack. The single high-throughput RAID controller utilizes the latest storage processor technology and runs a Linux based operating system to provide ultra-fast data transfer and maximum reliability.

Light-Weight RAID Kernel

The Linux operating system provides a stable environment for the RAID kernel and allows Active Storage to finely tune the system's performance while taking advantage of a world-class TCP/IP networking stack and 128-bit SSL security. The light-weight RAID kernel maintains a small memory footprint for fast execution, and is enhanced with hardware accelerated X-OR calculation. This hardware/software combination gives the ActiveRAID ES excellent storage performance in all parity RAID levels.

Our RAID kernel has been specifically tuned to deliver maximum RAID 5 and RAID 6 performance. Running in single controller mode the kernel provides a more balanced write to read ratio, as the system does not require cache coherency to be maintained. Latency and small file performance are improved in most operations such as database look-up and file serving. The system delivers excellent performance while guarding against any data loss by utilizing hardware accelerated parity RAID. Dual 4Gb Fibre-Channel ports on the RAID controller deliver near "line speed" performance, and support Apple mult-pathing and load balancing when using multiple LUNs.

Fault Tolerance

The Active Storage ES is a true business class fault tolerant RAID system. Each active component in the system is field replaceable and in most cases hot-swappable. All mechanical components such as cooling modules and hard drives are redundant and hot-swappable, guarding against the most common downtime causing failures found in low-cost RAID systems today. This design also provides excellent time to repair in the field. Like the original ActiveRAID, system power is provided by industry standard dual redundant and fully load-sharing, hot-swappable power supplies. The power supplies are controlled by a power distribution network built into the system. The design is far more sophisticated than other systems in this price range. The power supplies are integrated into the system design in order to allow trickle power for remote turn on, shutdown, and restart. This design also allows a soft power system, which provides cache flush and proper shutdown at the power switch, preventing backup battery drain and providing the best insurance against data loss due to improper shutdown. This also guards against unintended operator error.

The SAS expansion port on the RAID controller offers a dual, bi-directional 3GB/s throughput speed allowing the secondary expansion system to provide full-speed operation when connected to a primary RAID system. The Primary and Secondary expansion systems work together seamlessly to provide optimal performance and low-cost expansion, all with simplified user interaction like the original ActiveRAID.

The optional battery backed RAID controller cache system employs a sophisticated charging circuit designed specifically for the needs of the ActiveRAID and not an off-the shelf design as deployed by many competitors. The charging circuit maintains the highest level of charge while constantly conditioning the battery. This prevents the common and often less than adequate number of hours of protection seen in some other systems, especially after months or years of operation. The ActiveRAID ES with the optional Battery Backup Module will maintain your data in cache for a minimum of 72 hours. The ActiveRAID ES constantly monitors the battery condition and state providing early warning, and will even suggest replacement when necessary. Active Storage highly suggests the inclusion of the Battery Backup Module with every Active Storage ES system. This can be especially important in smaller businesses where UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supplies) are less likely to be deployed.

If your budget can support the installation of a UPS, rest assured the ActiveRAID ES will support it. The ES supports all popular UPS systems.

Easy Serviceability

The ActiveRAID ES is a modern design and takes advantage of recent industry advances in component design and packaging allowing field serviceability by the average user. The design provides the user a quick reference visual indication of failed or questionable components from both the front and rear of the enclosure with user selectable audible warning. Additionally, using the included native Mac OS X management suite, users receive notification by e-mail of a failed component or a warning event.

Detecting problems is important, but that's not the complete story. Serviceability without complex scripts or even hand tools will keep you up and running -- that is the goal of the ActiveRAID ES. The ability to exchange nearly all active components with no interruption of service and without having to execute complex and cumbersome scripts puts serviceability in the hands of the average IT person. In most cases the component will be hot-swappable. Simply identify the bad component visually, remove it, replace with a good component and that's it. No downtime, no hassle. In the case of the RAID controller, the system may remain powered on while the RAID controller is replaced, but data transfer to and from the system will be interrupted. The ActiveRAID ES utilizes the finest components and enterprise quality connectors to ensure long life and predictable results.

The ActiveRAID ES is a well engineered and quality built RAID system that has been thoroughly tested in Apple Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server Leopard environments, and to provide cross platform compatibility with Windows XP, Vista, Server 2000 and Linux.

Technology Partnerships

Active Storage maintains relationships with all popular Fibre-Channel infrastructure vendors to ensure Interoperability and best performance. Active Storage currently partners with Qlogic, Brocade, Cisco, ATTO Technology, LSI Logic, and Emulex. Active Storage continually tests and monitors conformance and compatibility with critical infrastructure partners.

The exceptional affordability of the ActiveRAID ES makes it ideal for tiered storage environments where it will provide high-capacity, low cost storage in tertiary tiers behind larger enterprise storage systems, or ActiveRAID systems. Active Storage works closely with BakBone, Atempo, Archiware, and Solutioneering to provide ILM, software backup and archive software solutions. Active Storage also works with tape library manufacturers to ensure compatibility with their products.

Overall, the ActiveRAID ES is the new standard in affordable high performance RAID storage for Apple users.

Management

Advanced RAID Management

The Apple Xserve RAID set the high-water mark for storage management on Mac OS X. Other RAID systems with clunky Windows Explorer-like browser based interfaces, difficult to use command line interfaces and even cryptic LCD displays just seemed antiquated and out of place, and more importantly not particularly Apple-friendly. Active Storage knew they could do better.

They asked a number of Apple users what would be the best storage management approach for them; the answer was unanimous: "a Cocoa management application." They got the message loud and clear and began developing a native application suite for Mac OS X, and they are happy to say it's here now. Setup, management, and monitoring. A perfect complement to the performance, redundancy, and features of the ActiveRAID. They feel it's absolutely the best way to manage external storage on Mac OS X.

Active Storage started out by breaking up the common grouping of administrative and monitoring functions in a single tool. User studies told Active Storage that the grouping of admin and monitoring was easier for the programmers, but was highly limiting in ease of use as RAID systems became more complex with features such as active/active redundancy and secondary expansion systems.

Most admin tasks are done in initial setup, or when updating or changing configurations which is infrequent. Whereas, the monitoring is often daily.

The complexity of displaying the "heavy lifting" management tasks alongside the "light-weight" daily monitoring views overly complicated the application. In a number of cases having joint management and monitoring -- even with separate passwords opened up the user up to making a catastrophic mistake such as deleting all their data. Let's face it, you are not likely to "Admin" your storage daily if you have chosen a reliable well performing product.

Active Storage found that by the separating out the setup and admin functions, they could make the Admin process more automated and guided, making the task much less laborious than found with other systems. They felt this was a much better approach for tasks that are so infrequent.

Active Admin

The Active Admin features a guided Setup making setting up your first or fiftieth ActiveRAID easy.

Because Active Admin is Mac OS X native, you won't have to deal with browser based application limitations and non Apple-like interfaces. To make setup even easier, Active Storage added Bonjour discovery. The guided setup gets you up and running in minutes, and allows changes to made on-the-fly without memorization of difficult commands or referring to long manuals.

Active Admin is not only easy to use, it's easy to get started with. Management is performed "out-of-band" over Ethernet. And because Active Storage built in Bonjour, you won't have to memorize IP addresses or use serial ports to initially talk to your RAID. If your Mac is on the network, you are ready to Admin your ActiveRAID. Choosing the best-optimized configuration for your application is automatic, as are software updates and non-disruptive firmware updates. Active Admin is as powerful as it is easy.

Management of the ActiveRAID is further simplified by the modern design of the RAID controller and the RAID Kernel. Many of the tasks required to set up and maintain earlier systems are just not required.

Active Viewer

By breaking out the daily monitoring tasks from the Admin functions, Active Storage was able to develop a fast "light-weight" native Mac OS X viewer providing an at-a-glance view of one or dozens of ActiveRAID systems. With a simple intuitive interface, there is no learning curve to deal with. And because it's a viewer only, you can't make a mistake and damage your configuration or destroy your data inadvertently.

Active viewer like Active Admin utilizes the power of Bonjour to make discovery and monitoring of ActiveRAID systems easy. The intuitive interface lets you navigate quickly and drill-down into the ActiveRAID. The viewer's remote capabilities let you monitor systems anywhere in the world as easily as you can monitor in the same room.

ActiveRAID Widget

Many current Apple storage users that Active Storage spoke with wanted an even simpler way to monitor their storage on a daily basis, and with the help of Mac OS X Leopard Active Storage was able to deliver it. They developed a simple yet highly effective Dashboard Widget.

The ActiveRAID widget provides an at-a-glance view of your system and utilizes the Growl notification system to keep you informed of warnings or failures in real-time. Clicking on a warning or failure opens the Active Viewer automatically allowing you a finer grain view of the event.

iPhone

With the native management suite complete, Active Storage knew they could do even more. Apple provided them the greatest application platform since Mac OS X -- the incredible iPhone. The iPhone presented them with the perfect canvas to reinvent storage management; they call it "Storage Remote Control." Monitoring your storage remotely was never more convenient or powerful. The application is also compatible with the iPad.

Performance

ActiveRAID ES Performance

The ActiveRAID ES was designed to deliver best in class price performance in common Mac IT environments. The ActiveRAID ES is a solid performer delivering excellent overall performance in Mac OS X server applications, and is well suited the average business class deployments such as Mac OS X Server based applications in small to medium sized companies, universities, and as primary storage when used with departmental servers.

The ActiveRAID ES shares the same high throughput and fault tolerant architecture of the original ActiveRAID, making it a proven performance platform. This allows the new ActiveRAID ES to deliver consistent and repeatable performance in demanding business applications.

Like all of Active Storage's products, the ActiveRAID ES undergoes extensive testing and optimization by Active Storage's trained Mac OS X Server certified technicians to ensure it delivers the best performance and most reliable operation possible. Active Storage's goal is to deliver the highest performing and most reliable RAID systems right out of the box.

The ActiveRAID ES uses a single high performance RAID controller and is ideal for business server applications. Additionally, the ActiveRAID ES is a perfect companion to the original ActiveRAID as a lower cost disk archive solution delivering substantial throughput and low latency required for optimum performance when used with ILM, video archive and disk-to-disk applications software.

Active Storage sees their users as partners, and value user input on testing, configurations, and interoperability. They want to hear from you on what works and what doesn't. They will answer your requests, and provide feedback and enhancements, as they are available.