Nexsan SATABeast Xi

Overview:

• High density storage - up to 84 TB in only 4U
• Built for Xserve and Mac Pro systems
• Revolutionary AutoMAID energy saving technology greatly reduces power consumption and operating costs
• Full Enterprise class performance, reliability and management
• Dual function Fibre Channel and iSCSI connectivity with wire-speed performance
• Flexible, scalable and completely OS independent. Supports a broad range of storage infrastructures.

SATABeast® Xi is the first, high density, energy efficient storage solution built for the Xserve and Mac Pro markets delivering 42 drives and dual RAID controllers in only 4U of rack space. SATABeast Xi complements Xserve and Mac Pro environments in physical look and feel including a GUI that is visually compatible with Leopard. While optimized for Apple environments, SATABeast Xi can be used as a storage solution in mixed environments with equal ease. SATABeast Xi is flexible, scalable and completely OS independent to easily support a broad range of computing infrastructures.

Based on the proven technology of Nexsan’s award-winning SATABeast, the SATABeast Xi provides the Apple market with a high density, plug and play solution that is complementary to Xserve’s existing storage options. SATABeast Xi delivers high end performance at the same exceptional price point as current SATABeast solutions including the energy efficiency features and software licenses to allow SATABeast Xi to operate out of the box without expensive add-ons.

Unprecedented Energy Saving

Nexsan delivers high performance, high capacity RAID storage system with the energy saving benefits of AutoMAID (Massive Array of Idle Disks) technology. AutoMAID allows SATABeast Xi to place its disk drives in an idle state to conserve energy yet provide near-instantaneous access to data. AutoMAID is granular to the individual drive level and enables users to determine the level of energy savings desired. This breaks new ground in the Xserve market where no other energy efficient storage solution of this caliber exists.

Unleash the Beast

For all your storage requirements including:

Primary Storage. SATABeast Xi is designed for primary storage of large data set applications like uncompressed, real-time HDTV as well as multi-stream and analog TV signals and high quality video editing with no frame drops. SATABeast Xi excels in cluster computing and enterprise environments where reliability and performance are an absolute. With blazing wire-speed read/write throughput and high IOPS performance, the SATABeast Xi is a perfect choice for compute-intensive applications.

Secondary Storage and Disk-to-Disk (D2D) Backup. SATABeast Xi is ideal for addressing secondary storage applications and disk-to-disk backup in which online access to data delivers superior business continuity and data protection as well as instant access to large volumes of data.

High Performance Across Both Fibre Channel and ISCSI

The SATABeast Xi has active/active RAID controllers each delivering dual function Fibre Channel and iSCSI connectivity at wire speed performance. SATABeast Xi has 4 gigabit Fibre Channel interface ports for connecting directly to your Xserve or Mac Pro systems, and is optimized to be compatible with Apple’s Xsan storage network software. With fully featured LUN mapping and LUN masking, the SATABeast Xi can be shared with apple and non-Apple servers, and allows users to easily configure the massive disk capacity for dozens of servers or one.

Enterprise-Class Reliability Management

SATABeast Xi offers a richer set of features with redundant controllers, mirrored cache, RAID 6. All individual SATABeast Xi components are fully redundant and hot swappable.

SATABeast Xi’s advanced mechanical design provides superior cooling for optimal thermal operation, and reduced drive vibration for improved drive reliability. SATABeast Xi has a full cache coherency design to ensure data integrity even with power loss.

SATABeast Xi’s NexScan® management interface is built into the controller, alleviating the need to have a separate server or application manage the storage array. Included are Tele-Guard™, a phone-home feature for user notification, and our WorldView feature enabling multibox management.

Features & Benefits:

Advanced Features

• Enterprise class storage array built around the latest high-capacity SATA disk drives.
• High performance – 800 MB/s sustained throughput with FC
• Reduced energy consumption and costs through AutoMAID™ technology.
• All active components are redundant and individually hot-swappable
• Highest density per rack inch
• Supports RAID 0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5 and 6
• WorldView™ - Provides ability to manage and configure multiple Nexsan units from a single GUI
• Anti-Accumulative Rotational Vibration design enables maximum drive reliability.
• Supports multiple RAID sets and multiple volumes per set.
• Horizontal midplane design promotes superior airflow and alleviates insertion stress points
• Integrated Fibre Channel and iSCSI connectivity for flexible implementation
• Completely OS independent. No special software drivers or server-based management applications required.
• Online SATABeast delivers access to data up to 500 times faster than tape libraries and 20x faster than other MAID systems.
• Embedded web-browsable GUI over 10/100/1000 port, supports email alerts and SNMP traps
• Up to 2GB cache per controller
• Supports up to 254 LUNS per controller

Key Benefits

• With SATABeast, Nexsan engineers have architected the industry's most complete and cost-effective high capacity storage system. SATABeast's advanced mechanical design provides superior cooling for optimal thermal operation, reduces drive vibration and delivers outstanding energy efficiency in an extreme density (42 drives in 4U high) form factor. SATABeast's unique design extends individual drive life and provides TCO savings year over year.
• SATABeast employs Nexsan's revolutionary AutoMAID™ energy saving technology. AutoMAID transparently places SATABeast disk drives in an idle state reducing power consumption and operational costs. AutoMAID delivers the cost-saving benefits of MAID (Massive Array of Idle Disks) without the limitations of slow access times and special host software. Nexsan's AutoMAID is granular to an individual drive or RAID set and enables users to determine the level of access speed and energy savings desired. AutoMAID is the first MAID architecture that supports VTL (Virtual Tape Libraries), full file format D2D and standard RAID implementations.
• SATABeast Xi performs continuous background integrity scans to ensure drive health and data accessibility. Each controller features full cache coherency to maintain data integrity even in the event of a power loss.
• Nexsan's award-winning high performance SATA RAID controller architecture utilizes dual RAID engines on each SATABeast Xi controller to provide extremely high throughput performance across 42 spindles. SATABeast Xi's 42 high capacity drives can be segmented into multiple RAID sets or a single large storage pool. LUN Mapping allows users to easily configure the massive disk capacity for dozens of servers or one.
• All individual SATABeast Xi components are fully redundant and hot swappable. This advanced design provides increased ROI by eliminating the need to replace an entire multi-drive blade should a single drive fail.
• SATABeast's Xi management interface is built into the SATABeast Xi controller, alleviating the need to have a separate server or application manage the storage array. This sophisticated management utility monitors and reports the status of all subsystems over a 10/100/1000-network port. Included in NexScan are Tele-GuardT, Nexsan's phone-home feature for user notification of errors or prediction of error, and WorldView, our multi-box management feature.

AutoMAID™ Energy Saving Technology:

Nexsan's evolutionary AutoMAID (Automatic Massive Array of Idle Disks) energy saving technology transparently places disk drives into an idle state to vastly reduce power and cooling costs. AutoMAID delivers the cost-effecdtive benefits of MAID 2.0 without the limitations of slow access times and special host software.

AutoMAID is granular to an individual drive or RAID set and offers multiple levels of energy savings. AutoMAID is user selectable enabling users to determine the right level of response time performance to energy savings. AutoMAID is the first MAID 2.0 architecture that supports VTL, full file format D2D and standard high performance RAID implementations.

Key Points

• AutoMAID reduces power and cooling costs
• Nexsan’s AutoMAID delivers the benefits of MAID without the limitations
• Available on Nexsan Assureon, SATABoy, SATABeast, and SATABeast Xi

AutoMAID Defined

• AutoMAID automatically reduces power consumption and heat generation on idle drives
• Trade-off between response times and power savings are user configurable
• AutoMAID behavior happens automatically and transparently to host – no software changes required
• Typical configuration settings:
  • Level 1: Heads Unloaded
    • 15% to 20% savings
    • Sub-second recovery time
  • Level 2: Heads Unloaded, slows to 4000 RPM
    • 35% to 45% savings
    • 15 second recovery time
  • Level 3: Stops spinning (sleep mode; powered on)
    • 60% to 70% savings
    • 30 to 45 second recovery time

AutoMAID Safety Features

• In maximum power saving mode, drive spin up is sequenced to reduce power surges
• Drives automatically wake up for periodic surface scan to ensure data integrity (user configurable)
• AutoMAID has no impact on performance if left on in data-intensive server applications
• Only two simple configuration settings – "timeout" and "power savings desired"

    

Technical Specifications:

 

SATABeast Technical Specifications
Specifications
External Host Interface / Channels	Dual 4Gb Fibre Channel SFP LC host ports per controller Dual iSCSI ports per controller Single or Dual active/active controllers
Internal Device Interface / Channels	Forty-two SATA/100 or 133 device channels
Controllers	Single or dual active/active RAID controllers
Management Port	RS-232
Cache	Up to 2GB cache per controller
RAID Levels	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, and 6
LUNs Supported	254
Power
Current Voltage	Nominal 350 watts 4.5 A @ 115VAC 2.5 A @ 230 VAC 1200 BTU/hour	Peak 750 watts 6.5 A @ 115VAC 3.5 A @ 230 VAC 2500 BTU/hour
Dimensions and Weight
Height	7 in. (4U)
Width	fits in standard 19" EIA rack with supplied mounting rails
Depth	29.5”
Weight	72.5 lbs (w/o disk drives)

SATABeast Xi User Interface - Configuration and Management:

The SATABeast Xi user interface provides access to your system from any standard Web browser including Safari or any host computer directly or via a LAN or WAN. The SATABeast Xi GUI is platform independent and requires no software or patches.

Automated status review of disk drives, power supplies, fans and RAID controllers Single click access to all problems and warnings Event log for all significant events stored on disk Automated array verification prior to production; automatic "parity scrub" performed as background task every 24 hours Additional access via RS-232 serial port or network interface to an ANSI terminal or emulator Complete listing of voltages, temperature, battery mode, cache settings, network settings, and blower RPM Automatic IP address assignment via DHCP, as well as manual IP Gleaning over serial port or via web page SMART environmental monitoring support

Cache management page allows local configuration or remotely via standard SCSI commands DNS support for symbolic addresses Easily build RAID sets, partition RAID volumes, map volumes to LUNs and host ports, as well as spares management Alerts and warnings sent via SMTP email alerts with problem summary, hyperlink to the enclosure management, as well as user-defined fields Extra security feature requires manual confirmation of destructive media operations Battery-backed Clock/Calendar used to time stamp all major events Configure and monitor subsystem using any standard web browse

SASBeast Teleguard - Phone Home:

Tele-Guard™ is Nexsan's "phone home" feature incorporated within our award-winning line of SATA storage solutions. Tele-Guard™ works in conjuction with the NexScan™ GUI to provide users with a simple, integrated set of tools to effectively manage and monitor your Nexsan storage system. Utilizing NexScan™, our WEB enabled GUI (Graphical User Interface), you can access your system from any standard internet browser. In addition, NexScan™ is platform independent and can be accessed directly from a host computer or over a LAN or WAN. NexScan™ uses standard html eliminating any need for special client software. Tele-Guard™ monitors all system parameters and allows either single or multiple user alerts to be sent via ' Plain English ' e-mails, Internet based SMS notification or Tele-Guard's™ pager support.

Boy and Beast Product Family:

 

Feature	SASBoy (SAS drives)	SASBeast (SAS drives)	SASBoy (SAS+SATA drives)	SASBeast (SAS+SATA drives)	SATABoy	SATABeast
Drive Types	SAS 300GB, 450GB, 600GB - 15000 RPM	SAS 300GB, 450GB, 600GB - 15000 RPM	SAS 300GB, 450GB, 600GB 15000 RPM and SATA 1TB 7200RPM	SAS 300GB, 450GB, 600GB - 15000 RPM and SATA 2TB and 1TB	SATA 1TB, 750GB, 500GB	SATA 2TB, 1TB, 750GB, 500GB
Drive Bays / Rack U	14 Drive Bays / 3U	42 Drive Bays / 4U	14 Drive Bays/ 3U ( 4SAS w/10 SATA or 7SAS w/ 7SATA)	42 Drive Bays / 4U (SAS or SATA in groups of 14)	14 Drive Bays / 3U	42 Drive Bays / 4U
Controllers	1 Standard Dual Optional Dual RAID Engines per Controller	1 Standard Dual Optional Dual RAID Engines per Controller	1 Standard Dual Optional Dual RAID Engines per Controller	1 Standard Dual Optional Dual RAID Engines per Controller	1 Standard Dual Optional	1 Standard Dual Optional
Battery Protected Cache per Controller	2GB Standard	2GB Standard	2GB Standard	2GB Standard	512MB, 1GB or 2GB	512MB, 1GB or 2GB
Host Ports	2 FC or 2 SAS and 2 iSCSI Ports per Controller	2 FC and 2 iSCSI Ports per Controller	2 FC or 2 SAS and 2 iSCSI Ports per Controller	2 FC and 2 iSCSI Ports per Controller	2 FC or 2 SAS and 2 iSCSI Ports per Controller	2 FC and 2 iSCSI Ports per Controller
Sustained Data Rates (with Dual Controllers)	820 MB/s Reads	1100+ MB/s Reads	820 MB/s Reads	1100+ MB/s Reads	540 + MB/s Reads (with single controller)	1100 MB/s Reads
Hardware RAID 6	Included	Included	Included	Included	Included	Included
RAID Levels	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, 6	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, 6	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, 6	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, 6	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, 6	0, 1, 1+0, 4, 5, 6
LUNs	254 per Controller	254 per Controller	254 per Controller	254 per Controller	254 per Controller	254 per Controller
Redundant Power Supplies	2 Redundant Standard 500 watt	2 Redundant Standard	2 Redundant Standard	2 Redundant Standard	2 Redundant Standard 400 watt	2 Redundant Standard 760 watt
Global "Hot Drive Spares"
Hot-pluggable Controllers, Drives, Power Supplies
Multiple RAID sets and LUNs per RAID set
254 LUNs per Controller
LUN Masking, ACL, Read Only Access
Nexsan WorldView Multi-unit Manager
Nexsan NexScan Onboard Browser Based GUI
Nexsan Tele-Guard Phone Home Manager
3 yr. Warranty, Advanced Exchange, 24x7 Support

Documentation:

Nexsan SATBeast Xi Datasheet (.PDF)