The good folks over in marketing made a sneak announcement on December 29th regarding the Disk Library for mainframe (DLm). Sneak because, lets be honest, how many of us had reading press releases as a high priority on December 29th?
In any event, there is some good stuff here. To revisit the core differentiator of the EMC DLm: this is a virtual tape library for mainframes that is not a disk cache. That is a significantly different architecture from either competitive offering from Sun or IBM--both of which are "merely" a small to medium size disk cache in front of a bunch of physical tape. Expensive disk. Expensive tape.
So EMC's approach is a little different: take the tape out of the equation. And a good chunk of the cost too. The DLm is far more than "just" a disk cache: by virtue of capacity and capability it enables you to store data more or less permanently on disk. Not to say that you will have no tape at the end of the day, but you will have a lot less than with other approaches.
Normally I don't like to just plug something new. However, I am willing to make an exception for something new and different. I want to do a brief foray into the world of mainframe attach virtual tape.
We danced around this a little while back when I talked about open systems virtual tape and the market share of the respective players. Specifically, about how technology and market share in open systems virtual tape, and technology and market share in mainframe attach virtual tape are two totally different things, and it is misleading at best to say that one has any genuine relevance to the other.
In that post, I don't think I made any bones about the fact that EMC is not a market leader in the mainframe virtual tape space. I think we are honest enough to admit that the two market leaders (in terms of share and units shipped) are Sun and IBM. However, we have recently introduced a new mainframe virtual tape offering--the Disk Library for Mainframe, or DLM--and it is pretty different than anything else out there.
The opinions expressed here are my personal opinions. Content published here is not read or approved in advance by EMC and does not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of EMC nor does it constitute any official communication of EMC.
