Cydrome Leader <presence at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
That's the biggest CX from that age... Hmmmm, it's quite a good machine...
You could somehow make a trade-in for a CX4-240 or CX4-480 and have a good
price (because of the crisis and recession)...

Other option is to go to Hitachi AMS2000 series which uses SAS drives, and
costs almost half of the same-range EMC CLARiiON... And they will surely
give you quite a discount if replacing this CX700...

Do you have any first hand reports on the AMS2000?

Yup, we sell it too...

Other option is to go to Hitachi AMS2000 series which uses SAS drives, and
costs almost half of the same-range EMC CLARiiON... And they will surely
give you quite a discount if replacing this CX700...

Do you have any first hand reports on the AMS2000?

Yup, we sell it too...

So what's the good and bad of them vs. the ams1000, aside from the change
in disk trays?

Cydrome Leader <presence at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
Other option is to go to Hitachi AMS2000 series which uses SAS drives, and
costs almost half of the same-range EMC CLARiiON... And they will surely
give you quite a discount if replacing this CX700...

Do you have any first hand reports on the AMS2000?

Yup, we sell it too...

So what's the good and bad of them vs. the ams1000, aside from the change
in disk trays?

Absolutely no idea... I'm in EMC team, not in Hitachi... All that I know is

that Hitachi guys (as well as my EMC team) are considering Hitachi AMS
series as a real problem when trying to sell EMC... Hitachi's more reliable
and almost twice cheaper, but there are other problems with Hitachi which
are more people-related than technology-related...

that Hitachi guys (as well as my EMC team) are considering Hitachi AMS
series as a real problem when trying to sell EMC... Hitachi's more reliable
and almost twice cheaper, but there are other problems with Hitachi which
are more people-related than technology-related... :)

Mmy opinion is the software for the hitachi stuff all sucks. There doesn't
seem to be any support website, I have no idea where you get docs, if they
exist or are even translated into English and the programs themselves are
just strange and somewhat crippled. I might use three different Hitachi
programs at once just to add a LUN to a host. It makes no sense, other
than Hitachi had non-technical people that can't spell SAN write the
management softare.

The hardware itself seems good. Every once in a while a drive fails and
somebody shows up to replace it.

Cydrome Leader <presence at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
that Hitachi guys (as well as my EMC team) are considering Hitachi AMS
series as a real problem when trying to sell EMC... Hitachi's more reliable
and almost twice cheaper, but there are other problems with Hitachi which
are more people-related than technology-related... :)

Mmy opinion is the software for the hitachi stuff all sucks. There doesn't
seem to be any support website, I have no idea where you get docs, if they
exist or are even translated into English and the programs themselves are
just strange and somewhat crippled. I might use three different Hitachi
programs at once just to add a LUN to a host. It makes no sense, other
than Hitachi had non-technical people that can't spell SAN write the
management softare.

Yes, that's Hitachi's main problem - software and support... EMC is calling
themselves 'software company', and are claiming that they're 4th biggest
software company... :)

Hitachi holds Asian market mostly, and they manufacture enterprise boxes for
HP and Sun, so they get a market share in EMEA/USA with these brands...

I believe that software is mainly
left to HP and Sun to design and > support...

The hardware itself seems good. Every once in a while a drive fails and
somebody shows up to replace it.

EMC has got the same stuff, when something in the storage array breaks down,
the storage box calls service center in Cork and sends data about what has
happened, so the partner can dispatch service crew and replace the
problematic parts...

Hitachi holds Asian market mostly, and they manufacture enterprise boxes for
HP and Sun, so they get a market share in EMEA/USA with these brands...

I know the older (maybe still true) HP arrays were hitachi if you opened
them up, but the support was still from HP and HP has some of the finest
docs out there.

The Hitachi field engineers seem great- they know the stuff inside and out
as they should, but when it comes to the damn management software, it
really seems like you're on your own.

For rebadged stuff, probably, but if you buy HDS stuff from a HDS reseller
or whatever that nonsense is called, you get to deal with HDS themselves
(at least in the US).

EMC has got the same stuff, when something in the storage array breaks down,
the storage box calls service center in Cork and sends data about what has
happened, so the partner can dispatch service crew and replace the
problematic parts...

The stuff here "calls home" though FTP. I keep meaning to snoop exactly
what is being sent to the HDS FTP site when a drive fails.

Cydrome Leader <presence at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
Hitachi holds Asian market mostly, and they manufacture enterprise boxes for
HP and Sun, so they get a market share in EMEA/USA with these brands...

I know the older (maybe still true) HP arrays were hitachi if you opened
them up, but the support was still from HP and HP has some of the finest
docs out there.

Yup... XP boxes are Hitachi USP and USP-V from the inside...

The Hitachi field engineers seem great- they know the stuff inside and out
as they should, but when it comes to the damn management software, it
really seems like you're on your own.

Talking to me, I've seen management for UPS machine... We were looking at it
trying to figure out which drives are installed inside... ))) Took us
about and hour...

For rebadged stuff, probably, but if you buy HDS stuff from a HDS reseller
or whatever that nonsense is called, you get to deal with HDS themselves
(at least in the US).

Here in Croatia, everything is sold through partners... My company is a
partner for almost everything that counts (EMC, Hitachi, IBM, HP, Sun,
VMware, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, etc)... When we sell any stuff, we have to
stock spare parts and take warranty on us...

Talking to me, I've seen management for UPS machine... We were looking at it
trying to figure out which drives are installed inside... ))) Took us
about and hour... ;)

That sounds about right.

All the error message have misleading IBM like error codes like
"KAIC10175-E" except there's no book to look up the error or what it
means. I suspect they're random and nobody knows what they are, even in
Japan.

Here in Croatia, everything is sold through partners... My company is a
partner for almost everything that counts (EMC, Hitachi, IBM, HP, Sun,
VMware, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, etc)... When we sell any stuff, we have to
stock spare parts and take warranty on us...

Interesting. So when an IBM customer has problems, you switch out your Sun
shirt and show up as IBM?

For HDS here, it seems they have real employees that come out, but simple
stuff like disk swaps is handled by a third party, like maintanence for
SUN and HP unless you have some sort of 4 hour support and a really big
deal problem. I have no problem with this as those techs know their stuff,
I really don't care what company name is on their paychecks.

Cydrome Leader <presence at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
Talking to me, I've seen management for UPS machine... We were looking at it
trying to figure out which drives are installed inside... ))) Took us
about and hour... ;)

That sounds about right.

All the error message have misleading IBM like error codes like
"KAIC10175-E" except there's no book to look up the error or what it
means. I suspect they're random and nobody knows what they are, even in
Japan.

:DDDDDDDDDDDDDD

Here in Croatia, everything is sold through partners... My company is a
partner for almost everything that counts (EMC, Hitachi, IBM, HP, Sun,
VMware, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, etc)... When we sell any stuff, we have to
stock spare parts and take warranty on us...

Interesting. So when an IBM customer has problems, you switch out your Sun
shirt and show up as IBM?

Nope... We have people designated for every vendor... Few guys are
technicians for their vendor, like 3 guys for EMC, 2 guys for HP, 2 for IBM,
3 for Sun, etc...

Don't know how business is done i USA, but here in smaller countries accross
Europe, almost everything is done via partners... So, let's say, EMC has got

and office in Croatia that serves 3 major partners, 1 distributor, 1
training centre... Croatia is a small country with 4 mil people, but we have
offices of almost every big vendor here... You'd be surprised, but this
market is very funny, a lot of enterprise boxes are sold here (EMC
Symmetrix, IBM DS8000, HP XP, Hitachi USP, IBM System-z, HP SuperDome,
etc)... Almost everything is done on FC SAN, and nobody even thinks about
iSCSI or NAS systems... )) Like I said, totally funny, nobody asks how
much it costs, all that is needed is that it's working and that it's
expensive...

For HDS here, it seems they have real employees that come out, but simple
stuff like disk swaps is handled by a third party, like maintanence for
SUN and HP unless you have some sort of 4 hour support and a really big
deal problem. I have no problem with this as those techs know their stuff,
I really don't care what company name is on their paychecks.

Well, we have a stock of spare parts for customers that have SLA's signed
with us...

Here most vendors have people who could do work, but they want to force
you to use a VAR as well. All most VARs do is try to sell you extra stupid
services you don't need and then botch the order up somehow. It seems like
a stupid way to do things to me, and it's especially annoying when they go
out of business. Try calling Cisco for license enable keys at 4pm on
Friday after your VAR went out of business or changed names. Even if Cisco
sends you new hardware, you have to deal with the stupid VAR to get
license keys again. It's completely stupid and whoever though of that
model needs to set on fire.

Even software companies make you do stupid stuff like find a VAR. Last
time I ordered Vmware, I had to call Vmware to find a VAR that never
returned my calls or emails. Then I had to call back to get the name of
another VAR, then I got a quote for the published price, then I had to
make a PO for the software and support. I didn't even get a piece of paper
or anything. It's completely retarded that I could not just type in a CC
number on vmware.com and download a license key. I had to fill out all
sort of paperwork to download a file from a website.

and office in Croatia that serves 3 major partners, 1 distributor, 1
training centre... Croatia is a small country with 4 mil people, but we have
offices of almost every big vendor here... You'd be surprised, but this
market is very funny, a lot of enterprise boxes are sold here (EMC
Symmetrix, IBM DS8000, HP XP, Hitachi USP, IBM System-z, HP SuperDome,
etc)... Almost everything is done on FC SAN, and nobody even thinks about
iSCSI or NAS systems... )) Like I said, totally funny, nobody asks how
much it costs, all that is needed is that it's working and that it's
expensive... :)

What do all these machines do- who uses them?

For HDS here, it seems they have real employees that come out, but simple
stuff like disk swaps is handled by a third party, like maintanence for
SUN and HP unless you have some sort of 4 hour support and a really big
deal problem. I have no problem with this as those techs know their stuff,
I really don't care what company name is on their paychecks.

Well, we have a stock of spare parts for customers that have SLA's signed
with us...

Here is the US major vendors have parts depots, either at
logistics/shipping company warehouses or at warehouses at major airports.

For instance, if I want a new fuser assembly for a HP laserjet, it's
probably sitting in a box, right now at UPS logistics (something like
that) in Kentucky . They get the order from HP, print a label and it get
shipped to me, probably within hours. If I need Netapp parts, I think
they're sitting in a warehouse by O'Hare international airport and a
courier or tech can get them to me in just a couple hours, maybe even
less. It works pretty nicely. I'm sure it's a bit slower if you're in some
far away rural area though.

caly... at (no spam) fly.srk.fer.hr.invalid wrote:
Cydrome Leader <prese... at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
Talking to me, I've seen management for UPS machine... We were looking at it
trying to figure out which drives are installed inside... ))) Took us
about and hour... ;)

That sounds about right.

All the error message have misleading IBM like error codes like
"KAIC10175-E" except there's no book to look up the error or what it
means. I suspect they're random and nobody knows what they are, even in
Japan.

:DDDDDDDDDDDDDD

Here in Croatia, everything is sold through partners... My company is a
partner for almost everything that counts (EMC, Hitachi, IBM, HP, Sun,
VMware, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, etc)... When we sell any stuff, we have to
stock spare parts and take warranty on us...

Interesting. So when an IBM customer has problems, you switch out your Sun
shirt and show up as IBM?

Nope... We have people designated for every vendor... Few guys are
technicians for their vendor, like 3 guys for EMC, 2 guys for HP, 2 for IBM,
3 for Sun, etc...

Ok.

Don't know how business is done i USA, but here in smaller countries accross
Europe, almost everything is done via partners... So, let's say, EMC has got

Here most vendors have people who could do work, but they want to force
you to use a VAR as well. All most VARs do is try to sell you extra stupid
services you don't need and then botch the order up somehow. It seems like
a stupid way to do things to me, and it's especially annoying when they go
out of business. Try calling Cisco for license enable keys at 4pm on
Friday after your VAR went out of business or changed names. Even if Cisco
sends you new hardware, you have to deal with the stupid VAR to get
license keys again. It's completely stupid and whoever though of that
model needs to set on fire.

Most maintenance from any company is handled by third parties that just
pretend to be from whatever vendor their work order says. It makes some
sense as less people can handle more work that way, and I'm sure it's
cheaper for everybody that way.

Even software companies make you do stupid stuff like find a VAR. Last
time I ordered Vmware, I had to call Vmware to find a VAR that never
returned my calls or emails. Then I had to call back to get the name of
another VAR, then I got a quote for the published price, then I had to
make a PO for the software and support. I didn't even get a piece of paper
or anything. It's completely retarded that I could not just type in a CC
number on vmware.com and download a license key. I had to fill out all
sort of paperwork to download a file from a website.

and office in Croatia that serves 3 major partners, 1 distributor, 1
training centre... Croatia is a small country with 4 mil people, but we have
offices of almost every big vendor here... You'd be surprised, but this
market is very funny, a lot of enterprise boxes are sold here (EMC
Symmetrix, IBM DS8000, HP XP, Hitachi USP, IBM System-z, HP SuperDome,
etc)... Almost everything is done on FC SAN, and nobody even thinks about
iSCSI or NAS systems... )) Like I said, totally funny, nobody asks how
much it costs, all that is needed is that it's working and that it's
expensive... :)

What do all these machines do- who uses them?

For HDS here, it seems they have real employees that come out, but simple
stuff like disk swaps is handled by a third party, like maintanence for
SUN and HP unless you have some sort of 4 hour support and a really big
deal problem. I have no problem with this as those techs know their stuff,
I really don't care what company name is on their paychecks.

Well, we have a stock of spare parts for customers that have SLA's signed
with us...

Here is the US major vendors have parts depots, either at
logistics/shipping company warehouses or at warehouses at major airports.

For instance, if I want a new fuser assembly for a HP laserjet, it's
probably sitting in a box, right now at UPS logistics (something like
that) in Kentucky . They get the order from HP, print a label and it get
shipped to me, probably within hours. If I need Netapp parts, I think
they're sitting in a warehouse by O'Hare international airport and a
courier or tech can get them to me in just a couple hours, maybe even
less. It works pretty nicely. I'm sure it's a bit slower if you're in some
far away rural area though.

But you can be creative. We purchased an EMC DMX through Dell with a
service contract direct with EMC. Purchasing through Dell got us
credits for our parent company that improves the discount that
corporate gets when buying other Dell products. I don't have to call
Del(hi) to get some level I bonehead to send it up through the Dell
^^^^^^^^^^

Cydrome Leader <presence at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
Here most vendors have people who could do work, but they want to force
you to use a VAR as well. All most VARs do is try to sell you extra stupid
services you don't need and then botch the order up somehow. It seems like
a stupid way to do things to me, and it's especially annoying when they go
out of business. Try calling Cisco for license enable keys at 4pm on
Friday after your VAR went out of business or changed names. Even if Cisco
sends you new hardware, you have to deal with the stupid VAR to get
license keys again. It's completely stupid and whoever though of that
model needs to set on fire.

Gees!! That's awful!!

Even software companies make you do stupid stuff like find a VAR. Last
time I ordered Vmware, I had to call Vmware to find a VAR that never
returned my calls or emails. Then I had to call back to get the name of
another VAR, then I got a quote for the published price, then I had to
make a PO for the software and support. I didn't even get a piece of paper
or anything. It's completely retarded that I could not just type in a CC
number on vmware.com and download a license key. I had to fill out all
sort of paperwork to download a file from a website.

Well, for VMware we have 2 VARs in Croatia, and me and my colleague
configure what should be ordered for each project, then register project
with VMware (for better discounts) and then our purchasing manager orders
those licences from VARs... We get licences the same or next day...

and office in Croatia that serves 3 major partners, 1 distributor, 1
training centre... Croatia is a small country with 4 mil people, but we have
offices of almost every big vendor here... You'd be surprised, but this
market is very funny, a lot of enterprise boxes are sold here (EMC
Symmetrix, IBM DS8000, HP XP, Hitachi USP, IBM System-z, HP SuperDome,
etc)... Almost everything is done on FC SAN, and nobody even thinks about
iSCSI or NAS systems... )) Like I said, totally funny, nobody asks how
much it costs, all that is needed is that it's working and that it's
expensive... :)

What do all these machines do- who uses them?

Banks, newspaper companies, telecom companies, etc... Here we call it
enterprise companies, but in US terms this should be true mid-range
companies (from 500 to 5000 employees)... :)

For HDS here, it seems they have real employees that come out, but simple
stuff like disk swaps is handled by a third party, like maintanence for
SUN and HP unless you have some sort of 4 hour support and a really big
deal problem. I have no problem with this as those techs know their stuff,
I really don't care what company name is on their paychecks.

Well, we have a stock of spare parts for customers that have SLA's signed
with us...

Here is the US major vendors have parts depots, either at
logistics/shipping company warehouses or at warehouses at major airports.

Cool!

For instance, if I want a new fuser assembly for a HP laserjet, it's
probably sitting in a box, right now at UPS logistics (something like
that) in Kentucky . They get the order from HP, print a label and it get
shipped to me, probably within hours. If I need Netapp parts, I think
they're sitting in a warehouse by O'Hare international airport and a
courier or tech can get them to me in just a couple hours, maybe even
less. It works pretty nicely. I'm sure it's a bit slower if you're in some
far away rural area though.

That's really cool way of doing things! Here in Croatia, partner has to buy
spare parts and place it in it's own parts depot... And parts are not
cheap...

On Sep 19, 9:47?pm, Cydrome Leader <prese... at (no spam) MUNGEpanix.com> wrote:
caly... at (no spam) fly.srk.fer.hr.invalid wrote:
Cydrome Leader <prese... at (no spam) mungepanix.com> kenjka:
Talking to me, I've seen management for UPS machine... We were looking at it
trying to figure out which drives are installed inside... ))) Took us
about and hour... ;)

That sounds about right.

All the error message have misleading IBM like error codes like
"KAIC10175-E" except there's no book to look up the error or what it
means. I suspect they're random and nobody knows what they are, even in
Japan.

:DDDDDDDDDDDDDD

Here in Croatia, everything is sold through partners... My company is a
partner for almost everything that counts (EMC, Hitachi, IBM, HP, Sun,
VMware, Oracle, SAP, Microsoft, etc)... When we sell any stuff, we have to
stock spare parts and take warranty on us...

Interesting. So when an IBM customer has problems, you switch out your Sun
shirt and show up as IBM?

Nope... We have people designated for every vendor... Few guys are
technicians for their vendor, like 3 guys for EMC, 2 guys for HP, 2 for IBM,
3 for Sun, etc...

Ok.

Don't know how business is done i USA, but here in smaller countries accross
Europe, almost everything is done via partners... So, let's say, EMC has got

Here most vendors have people who could do work, but they want to force
you to use a VAR as well. All most VARs do is try to sell you extra stupid
services you don't need and then botch the order up somehow. It seems like
a stupid way to do things to me, and it's especially annoying when they go
out of business. Try calling Cisco for license enable keys at 4pm on
Friday after your VAR went out of business or changed names. Even if Cisco
sends you new hardware, you have to deal with the stupid VAR to get
license keys again. It's completely stupid and whoever though of that
model needs to set on fire.

Most maintenance from any company is handled by third parties that just
pretend to be from whatever vendor their work order says. It makes some
sense as less people can handle more work that way, and I'm sure it's
cheaper for everybody that way.

Even software companies make you do stupid stuff like find a VAR. Last
time I ordered Vmware, I had to call Vmware to find a VAR that never
returned my calls or emails. Then I had to call back to get the name of
another VAR, then I got a quote for the published price, then I had to
make a PO for the software and support. I didn't even get a piece of paper
or anything. It's completely retarded that I could not just type in a CC
number on vmware.com and download a license key. I had to fill out all
sort of paperwork to download a file from a website.

and office in Croatia that serves 3 major partners, 1 distributor, 1
training centre... Croatia is a small country with 4 mil people, but we have
offices of almost every big vendor here... You'd be surprised, but this
market is very funny, a lot of enterprise boxes are sold here (EMC
Symmetrix, IBM DS8000, HP XP, Hitachi USP, IBM System-z, HP SuperDome,
etc)... Almost everything is done on FC SAN, and nobody even thinks about
iSCSI or NAS systems... )) Like I said, totally funny, nobody asks how
much it costs, all that is needed is that it's working and that it's
expensive... :)

What do all these machines do- who uses them?

For HDS here, it seems they have real employees that come out, but simple
stuff like disk swaps is handled by a third party, like maintanence for
SUN and HP unless you have some sort of 4 hour support and a really big
deal problem. I have no problem with this as those techs know their stuff,
I really don't care what company name is on their paychecks.

Well, we have a stock of spare parts for customers that have SLA's signed
with us...

Here is the US major vendors have parts depots, either at
logistics/shipping company warehouses or at warehouses at major airports.

For instance, if I want a new fuser assembly for a HP laserjet, it's
probably sitting in a box, right now at UPS logistics (something like
that) in Kentucky . They get the order from HP, print a label and it get
shipped to me, probably within hours. If I need Netapp parts, I think
they're sitting in a warehouse by O'Hare international airport and a
courier or tech can get them to me in just a couple hours, maybe even
less. It works pretty nicely. I'm sure it's a bit slower if you're in some
far away rural area though.

Years ago the concept of a VAR was explained to me as a company that
could sell us OEM parts at a discount, assist with the specs,
configuration, administration, etc. I asked, um, are you replacing us
Admins with these people? I got no answer from management.
Fortunately it has yet to happen, much. Today, years later, it seems
the only way you can buy equipment, parts, licenses, or service
contracts from an OEM is through a VAR.

But you can be creative. We purchased an EMC DMX through Dell with a
service contract direct with EMC. Purchasing through Dell got us
credits for our parent company that improves the discount that
corporate gets when buying other Dell products. I don't have to call
Del(hi) to get some level I bonehead to send it up through the Dell
idiots only to be told that they will have to call EMC anyways. I
just call EMC. It's all about what you put in your contract. Don't
be spoon fed by the "VAR".

It's really annoying, since most places won't even return a call unless
you want prices on some million dollar project, and even then, you have to
beat them to even get a price without all the "extras" they try to hustle
on you in removed. Granted, even major makers are annoying as well. Just
try to call up EMC and get a quote on an exact list of hardware. They
won't do it.