Cisco MDS 9216i, Multiprotocol Services Module Designed for Cost-Effective, Highly Secure Transport of Storage Traffic Over Metro, Wide Area Networks.
Cisco Systems ) today added two products to its award-winning Cisco MDS 9000 Family of Multilayer Intelligent directors and fabric switches optimized for transporting storage area network (SAN) traffic outside of the data center, which make them ideally suited for business continuance, disaster recovery, and remote backup applications.
Both products, the Cisco MDS 9216i fabric switch and the Cisco MDS 9000 Multiprotocol Services Module, are equipped with 14 Fibre Channel ports (2-gigabits/second) along with two Gigabit Ethernet ports, which can be configured to support either Fibre Channel over Internet Protocol (FCIP) or Internet Small Computer Systems Interface (iSCSI). Both products support the latest version of the operating system for the Cisco MDS 9000, the SAN-OS 2.0 (see today’s related announcement), which offers features such as hardware-assisted compression, FCIP tape acceleration, hardware-based IPSec encryption, and extended Fibre Channel buffer credits — all designed to make SAN extension over metro and wide area networks more efficient, less costly, and more secure.
“SAN extension, replication, and remote backup are all critical components of an overall disaster recovery, business continuity solution,” said Dianne McAdam, senior analyst at the Data Mobility Group. “The Cisco MDS 9216i and the Multiprotocol Services Module deliver these capabilities in a compact and tightly integrated form factor, which further enhances Cisco’s multiprotocol SAN switching portfolio.”
As with all modules in the Cisco MDS 9000 Family, the Multiprotocol Services Module is designed for use with any MDS 9000 modular chassis, specifically the MDS 9500 Series directors and the MDS 9200 Series Modular fabric switches. By choosing from the wide variety of optionally available MDS 9000 modules, customers can deploy scalable, feature-rich storage networks taking advantage of high-performance Fibre Channel switching, integrated multiprotocol switching, mainframe channel extension, network-hosted storage applications, and now highly optimized SAN extension capabilities.
The Cisco MDS 9216i is a stand-alone system and is part of the Cisco MDS 9200 Series, the industry’s first fabric switches to offer an expansion slot capable of supporting any of the Cisco MDS 9000 modules. Additionally, the Cisco MDS 9216i shares a common architecture with the Cisco MDS 9000 Family, providing industry-leading functionality, scalability and management.
Pricing and Availability
The Cisco MDS 9216i and the Multiprotocol Services Module are currently undergoing qualification testing with Cisco’s storage reseller partners. Pricing and availability will be announced by the individual companies beginning in Q4 of calendar year 2004.
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