PRESS RELEASE 19 October 2004

Apple Updates Xserve RAID Storage System

Delivers up to 5.6TB of Storage at Industry Breakthrough Price of Just Over £1.79 per GB

CUPERTINO, California — October 19th, 2004
Apple today updated its Xserve RAID storage system, a 3U high-availability, rack storage system to deliver a massive 5.6 terabytes (TB) of storage capacity at the industry's most aggressive price for storage of just over £1.79 per gigabyte (inc VAT). Apple has also expanded support for heterogeneous environments with certification from Cisco and SUSE Linux and optimised the system to work with its Xsan Storage Area Network file system.
“Xserve RAID features a breakthrough, high-performance storage architecture that is the perfect complement to any Xserve G5 system”, said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “We're now offering more capacity at an even lower price per gigabyte in a system that has been optimised and certified to run with leading enterprise applications and systems”.
The unique architecture of Xserve RAID delivers massive storage density and incredible performance. Fourteen independent 400GB Ultra ATA drive channels provide up to 5.6TB of storage capacity with pricing as low as £1.79 per GB (inc VAT) while the dual independent RAID controllers with 512MB cache per controller offer sustained throughput of over 380MBps — high enough to support two streams of uncompressed 10-bit HD video editing using protected RAID level 5.
“Apple's Xserve RAID systems deliver enterprise-class storage at a dramatically lower cost compared to competitive offerings”, said Chris Hanson, director of Web Technologies at Seitel, a leading provider of seismic data to the oil and gas industry. “We're planning to add 30 terabytes of the updated Xserve RAID storage over the next six months, bringing our total capacity to 100 terabytes”.
Xserve RAID connects easily to any Xserve server or Power Mac desktop system using the dual-channel 2GB Apple Fibre Channel PCI-X card sold separately at an industry breakthrough price of £349 (inc VAT). This high-speed, industry-standard storage interface offers dedicated bandwidth with a throughput of up to 400MBps. Apple's PCI-X card comes with two high-speed 2.9-metre copper fibre channel SFP-to-SFP cables and accepts SFP optical transceivers for use with fiber-optic cables over a long distance.
Apple offers a choice of world-class services and support programs for Xserve RAID including 4-hour on-site response, 24x7 technical support, AppleCare Service Parts Kits and the AppleCare Professional SupportLine programme.
Pricing & Availability:

The new Xserve RAID is available today through the Apple Store and Apple Authorised Resellers. Xserve RAID comes in three standard configurations, or can be fully customised to meet specific customer requirements. Build-to-order options can include additional Apple Drive Modules and cache battery modules. Xserve RAID with a suggested retail price of £4599 (inc VAT) includes:
  • 1TB RAID 0 total available storage;
  • dual independent RAID controllers with 512MB cache per controller;
  • dual 2GB Fibre Channel SFP ports with 200MBps throughput per channel;
  • four 250GB ATA/100 Apple Drive Modules; and
  • 8MB on-drive cache.

  • 2.8TB RAID 0 total available storage;
  • dual independent RAID controllers with 512MB cache per controller;
  • dual 2GB Fibre Channel SFP ports with 200MBps throughput per channel;
  • seven 400GB ATA/100 Apple Drive Modules; and
  • 8MB on-drive cache.

  • 5.6TB RAID 0 total available storage;
  • dual independent RAID controllers with 512MB cache per controller;
  • dual 2GB Fibre Channel SFP ports with 200MBps throughput per channel;
  • fourteen 400GB ATA/100 Apple Drive Modules; and
  • 8MB on-drive cache.

Press Contacts:
Apple UK and Ireland Public Relations
Email: [email protected]
Phone: +44 (0)20 8218 1440
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