In building this storage utility, Storage Elements recognized the need to utilize a storage platform that had the potential of massive capacity, while ensuring that performance was maintained as the number of terabytes grew. The company also needed to provide 24-hour availability of information to its global and diverse base of clients.

"It was critical to implement an architecture that simplified the management burden when building our storage utility", stated Brad Wenzel, CEO of Storage Elements. "The design requirements quickly eliminated many of the lower capacity and performance choices on the market, as it would take multiple systems to build the necessary architecture, while sacrificing management simplicity."

After evaluating a wide range of products, Storage Elements chose a combination of Xyratex JBOD arrays and Digi-Data controllers. The Xyratex disk arrays are designed for Enterprise applications that demand high performance and the ultimate level of reliability.

"We are pleased that Storage Elements chose Digi-Data for their mission-critical application. The combination of our controllers and Xyratex's JBODs proved to provide the best solution for Storage Elements' requirements of high-performance, highly available, extremely expandable systems", stated Vince Scarlata, Digi-Data's director of OEM Sales.

Digi-Data's clustered architecture delivers high availability and enables performance to aggregate by adding controllers over the array. In lab testing, an additional 350 MB/s was gained for every controller used with Xyratex arrays.

"As the requirements increase for larger and faster systems, we will work with Digi-Data through our network of storage integrators to meet demanding requirements in various imaging applications and data protection architectures", added Lisa Hart, Xyratex Vice President of Marketing.