3ware. Driving Switched RAID Solutions.

3ware, Inc. is the technology leader in switched storage solutions delivering reliable, scalable, high-performance storage connectivity and management. Since its founding in 1997, the privately held company has been focused on developing and refining their packet switching storage architecture to develop a class of ATA RAID controllers that satisfy the growing need for reliable, affordable storage.

As the first company to deliver a server class RAID controller for ATA drives. 3ware's advanced switching technology enables RAID solutions using cost-effective ATA drives to deliver the performance and reliability customers have come to expect from SCSI and Fibre Channel solutions, at a much lower cost.

The Escalade family of ATA RAID controllers was introduced in 2000 and quickly became the new standard for ATA RAID. Now in its 4th generation, Escalade controllers continue to set the benchmark for reliability, performance and scalability
 
 

 

 

Switched, dedicated ports - StorSwitch™ Architecture

3ware’s StorSwitch architecture applies network packet switching principles to storage. It replaces the shared bus architecture found in SCSI and Fibre Channel systems with a non-blocking switch fabric. This switch fabric reduces the requirement for expensive on-board cache, eliminates shared bus arbitration and dramatically reduces host CPU loading. The result is improved I/O throughput, complete fault isolation, and a scalable hardware platform that delivers the full performance of each drive. 3ware currently offers products with two to twelve switch ports supporting up to twelve ATA disk drives.

Advanced Firmware for Optimum RAID Reliability and Performance

3ware has developed an advanced RAID firmware optimized to take full advantage of the StorSwitch switch fabric.
This advanced firmware delivers server class features one expects with more expensive SCSI and Fibre Channel products, but that no one else provides in ATA; such as command read-back, command reordering, elevator seeks, dynamic sector repair, background scrubbing, asynchronous error messaging, and more.

3ware's advanced firmware runs on an onboard CPU to control I/O transactions, parse all RAID commands and handle drive errors; minimizing host processing and PCI traffic, thereby freeing the host CPU and system bus for other tasks.

3ware's advanced firmware makes possible a more elegant, simplified solution. Read the rest of this white paper by clicking here.......

Copyright 2002 Computer & Control Solutions, Inc.