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  • 1.  NetApp 2040 Licensing. What should we get? Any recommendations?

    Posted Nov 25, 2009 05:44 PM

    We are most likely getting the NetApp FAS2040 and after getting a few quotes run I quickly found out that licensing is a pretty significant cost and can DOUBLE a quote quickly. I am looking advice on what is truly a absolute need and would really like to not pay for something that we wont use or is not worth purchasing. Initially our vendor tried selling us the Server Bundle Pack which costed upwards of 24k. This put us way out of budget so it was cut. We are working with our vendor and are doing a la cart style.

    Our requirements for the storage is mainly to consolidate file servers, so we will most likely need CIFS to perform this function. I believe this is an additional license cost. Also, we will be hosting about 20-30VM's (servers, no VDI) VMDK's in VMFS volumes over iSCSI or NFS. I've heard that NFS might be the way to go but haven't really decided, but NFS is also an additional license.

    Are there any other licensing products or packs we should consider? Any worth looking closer at? The only ones that have caught my eye are the VM backup products like SnapManager for Virtual Infrastructure since we currently have no VMware DR solution or backup in place.

    I am a complete noob to NetApp products so any help would be greatly appreciated.

    Richard



  • 2.  RE: NetApp 2040 Licensing. What should we get? Any recommendations?

    Posted Nov 25, 2009 05:59 PM

    If you are TRULY serious about what to buy DON'T buy Netapp, buy Compellent or EMC. Call them, they will explain how and why they are different. We have Netapp, and it was great BEFORE VM's were popular...now we are stuck, because of costs and politics, but believe me we would switch to something OTHER than Netapp in a heartbeat if we could...

    Our requirements for the storage is mainly to consolidate file servers, so we will most likely need CIFS to perform this function. I believe this is an additional license cost. Also, we will be hosting about 20-30VM's (servers, no VDI) VMDK's in VMFS volumes over iSCSI or NFS. I've heard that NFS might be the way to go but haven't really decided, but NFS is also an additional license.

    If however you are intent on Netapp, make sure to include SIS (Netapp Deduplication) as well as those others, and yes they do cost $$$ extra, but that's another selling point with another SAN vendor :smileyhappy:



  • 3.  RE: NetApp 2040 Licensing. What should we get? Any recommendations?

    Posted Nov 25, 2009 06:14 PM

    Hello.

    Our requirements for the storage is mainly to consolidate file servers, so we will most likely need CIFS to perform this function. I believe this is an

    additional license cost. Also, we will be hosting about 20-30VM's (servers, no VDI) VMDK's in VMFS volumes over iSCSI or NFS. I've heard that NFS > might be the way to go but haven't really decided, but NFS is also an additional license.

    The CIFS license would make consolidating the file servers pretty easy. It sometimes comes standard, but unless it is extremely expensive it will pay for itself in short order by eliminating file servers. For the virtual machines, you could definitely use iSCSI. Sometimes this comes standard as well, but I have never dealt with the 2040 - It may differ. The NFS license is pricey, but it does bring along some significant operational simplification. If we are talking in terms of absolute need then the NFS license is going to be tough to justify over the iSCSI option.

    Are there any other licensing products or packs we should consider? Any worth looking closer at? The only ones that have caught my eye are the

    VM backup products like SnapManager for Virtual Infrastructure since we currently have no VMware DR solution or backup in place.

    The SnapManager for VI product is good for quick restores of your virtual machines, but this sometimes tends to fall under the "would be nice to have" category. It relies on NetApp snapshots and doesn't get you full DR recoverability (without replication and additional cost) and will also require additional disk space to implement. Depending on your edition of VMware (assuming you have vSphere), you may be able to leverage VMware Data Recovery as a lower cost option to achieve a similar result to what SnapManager offers. The same limitations will still apply.

    The NetApp forums are also an excellent place to post these questions, if you haven't checked them out already. There are lots of very knowledgeable/helpful people over there.

    Good Luck!