Brocade have announced the availability of Brocade Access Gateway
for IBM BladeCenter solutions. The new feature enables interoperability
between Brocade blade Storage Arca Network (SAN) switches and products
from other SAN switch and director manufacturers, while also simplifying
SAN management and reducing costs.
It also claims to utilize N Port ID Virtualization (NPIV)
technology, which has been standardized by the industry's T11
Technical Committee as a method to virtualize multiple SAN devices for
greater interoperability and scalability. It is compatible with all IBM
BladeCenter chassis and IBM-supported Fibre Channel HBAs, and is a key
addition to BladeCenter Open Fabric.
The new capability allows organizations to connect BladeCenter
servers to any vendors' SAN fabric that supports NPIV, enabling
devices to operate seamlessly, improving the scalability and management
of enterprise SANs. In addition, the use of NPIV technology contributes
to lower operational costs by allowing server and storage administrators
to manage larger and more consolidated SANs with fewer switch domain
counts, thereby simplifying overall SAN management.
www.brocade.com/products
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