Re: Advice on a new 16 bay FC RAID Chassis - Rouke/Dulce/Enhance Tech

Bob, your sentiments about uniformed users buying SAN systems are right on - but I need to raise a point here.

I was one of them. I needed to build a SAN for my editing team (a non-tech-savvy group) when I came on board at my company. So, I researched it, got as much input as I could, and settled on a 3-station MetaSAN system with an Apple XRAID (going on 2 years ago now). I spent SOOO much time researching it and trying to get it all to work.

If I did it all again, I would without hesitation bring in an integrator to do it, soup-to-nuts. Not hiring one wasn't worth the time I lost.

My point is this: I want to encourage you integrators out there, make a case for what you do! It's nebulous and the value isn't clear to the newbies out there who know enough to KNOW they need shared storage, but don't know where to go from there.

When I look for "SAN vendors" I get the software & hardware manufacturers, many of which are happy to sell you their piece of the puzzle. Some do encourage you to talk to an integrator*, but the point often gets lost in the mountain of info to absorb.

The popularity of Bob's DIY SAN solution article is case-in-point for a need for this.

It's still my fault for not knowing this (though, in hindsight, not sure how I could have learned it otherwise). I guess I'd like to see the experts who can *actually solve the entire business problem* make themselves heard, do so. Vendors: tout your favorite integrators! Make them your "partners" so you move more product.

It's just a complicated frackin' problem - too much for a one-vendor problem. Storage, edit station, cabling & networking, asset mgmt. & workflow - all need to be addressed together.

*For the record, Bernard Lambourelle at Tiger-Tech did mention the vendor, but it just seemed simple enough at the time that I went it alone. Learn from my mistake!

- Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.

Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, MetaSAN, CatDV Server