IBM manual Positioning, Common set of functions, DS8000 compared to ESS

physically located (installed) inside the DS8000 subsystem and can automatically monitor the state of your system, notifying you and IBM when service is required.

The S-HMC is also the interface for remote services (call home and call back). Remote connections can be configured to meet customer requirements. It is possible to allow one or more of the following: call on error (machine detected), connection for a few days (customer initiated), and remote error investigation (service initiated). The remote connection between the management console and the IBM service organization will be done via a virtual private network (VPN) point-to-point connection over the internet or modem.

The DS8000 comes with a four year warranty on both hardware and software. This is outstanding in the industry and shows IBM’s confidence in this product. Once again, this makes the DS8000 a product with a low total cost of ownership (TCO).

1.3 Positioning

The IBM TotalStorage DS8000 is designed to provide exceptional performance, scalability, and flexibility while supporting 24 x 7 operations to help provide the access and protection demanded by today's business environments. It also delivers the flexibility and centralized management needed to lower long-term costs. It is part of a complete set of disk storage products that are all part of the IBM TotalStorage DS Family and is the IBM disk product of choice for environments that require the utmost in reliability, scalability, and performance for mission-critical workloads.

1.3.1 Common set of functions

The DS8000 series supports many useful features and functions which are not limited to the DS8000 series. There is a set of common functions that can be used on the DS6000 series as well as the DS8000 series. Thus there is only one set of skills necessary to manage both families. This helps to reduce the management costs and the total cost of ownership.

The common functions for storage management include the IBM TotalStorage DS Storage Manager, which is the Web-based graphical user interface, the IBM TotalStorage DS Command-Line Interface (CLI), and the IBM TotalStorage DS open application programming interface (API).

FlashCopy, Metro Mirror, Global Copy, and Global Mirror are the common functions regarding the Advanced Copy Services. In addition to this, the DS6000/DS8000 series mirroring solutions are also compatible between IBM TotalStorage ESS 800 and ESS 750, which offers a new era in flexibility and cost effectiveness in designing business continuity solutions.

DS8000 compared to ESS

The DS8000 is the next generation of the Enterprise Storage Server, so all functions which are available in the ESS are also available in the DS8000 (with the exception of Metro/Global Copy). From a consolidation point of view, it is now possible to replace four ESS Model 800s with one DS8300. And with the LPAR implementation you get an additional consolidation opportunity because you get two storage system logical partitions in one physical machine.

Since the mirror solutions are compatible between the ESS and the DS8000 series, it is possible to think about a setup for a disaster recovery solution with the high performance DS8000 at the primary site and the ESS at the secondary site, where the same performance is not required.

Chapter 1. Introduction to the DS8000 series 11