Respond with flexibility and speed
Requirements for an effective SAP enterprise storage infrastructure include disk and tape system platforms; software tools for storage infrastructure management, point-in-time copy, archiving and content management; backup and recovery; virtualization and other functions. IBM has worked closely with SAP for more than three decades. IBM System Storage™ platform, software and service components provide the solutions for an effective SAP enterprise storage information infrastructure.
- Disk storage
- At the core of the IBM infrastructure for SAP environments is a complete range of disk storage products and solutions designed to serve virtually any size business running SAP applications.
- For large enterprises, IBM System Storage™ DS8000™ for data-intensive SAP environments is designed to support continuous operations for mission-critical workloads.
- The IBM XIV® Storage System is a next-generation, innovative high-end open disk enterprise storage system based on a grid of standard, off-the-shelf hardware components, designed to provide the highest levels of performance, reliability, and functionality with unprecedented ease of management and exceptionally low TCO.
- The IBM System Storage DS6000™ series is designed to provide enterprise-class functionality, high availability and high performance in a small, cost-effective scalable package with mainframe host attachment.
- For industry-leading midrange performance for demanding SAP application workloads, DS5000 delivers high availability for transactional SAP databases and OLTP applications, multi-dimensional scalability and unprecedented investment protection through field-replaceable host interfaces to grow capacity or reconfigure on the fly—ensuring that it will keep pace with your growing company.
- IBM System Storage™ DS4000™ mid-range storage solutions help provide SAP business landscapes with low total cost of ownership, high performance, robust functionality and unparalleled ease of use.
- Small SAP businesses can take an overburdened internal storage infrastructure to a new level with IBM’s new entry-level flexible and affordable IBM System Storage DS3200 (SAS), DS3300 (iSCSI) and DS3400 (FC) storage systems.
- IBM System Storage DR550 is designed to provide secure, scalable and cost-effective information retention supporting the compliant archiving of files, e-mail, digital images, database applications and instant messages for both non-SAP and SAP R/3 and NetWeaver applications. DR550 supports ILM from SAP via IBM CommonStore for SAP with WebDAV interface support. The DR550 also manages tape for lower TCO tiered storage environments.
- IBM network attached storage (NAS) products provide a wide range of capabilities. The IBM System Storage N series N5000, N6000 and N7000 NAS systems and associated gateways are designed to deliver mid to high-end enterprise storage and data management value with midrange affordability. For smaller businesses, IBM System Storage N3700 is designed to offer fast data access with extremely low maintenance requirements.
- Tape storage
- Tape storage can help SAP IT users manage their storage requirements and leverage the value of tape in the storage hierarchy. In the period from 1952 to today, IBM tape innovations have brought a wave of increased functionality, improved performance, reduced service time, decreased necessary floor space, and simplified tape path.
- IBM enterprise class tape products are designed to offer high performance, availability, reliability, and capacity to meet needs of SAP customers seeking storage solutions for mass storage, data archiving, enterprise backup, and disaster recovery. For example, the IBM System Storage TS1130 Tape Drive offers high capacity, fast access to data and long-term data retention with up to 3 TB at 3:1 compression and maximum 160 MBps native data rate. Additionally, The IBM System Storage™ TS7650G ProtecTIER™ De-duplication Gateway solution enables significant infrastructure cost reductions with high-performance in-line data de-duplication, optional two node clustering, and up to 1 petabyte (PB) of physical storage capacity per system. Combined with IBM storage, the ProtecTIER Gateway solution provides an optimal disk-based target for SAP backup and archive data.
- Midrange and entry-level tape offerings include low cost to high end large capacity models, and include TS3100/TS3200 tape libraries that leverage Linear Tape Open capability well–suited for handling backup, save and restore and archival data–storage needs for small to medium–size SAP environments. LTO helps reduce media wear and tear, and delivers exceptional performance and availability at an economical price point.
- IBM Storage Area Network infrastructure and Virtualization
- For the dynamic SAP IT environment, IBM offers a full line up of intelligent Storage Area Network (SAN) switches, directors and routers to connect servers and storage systems in local, campus, metro and global infrastructures.
- IBM SAN switches provide the reliable, scalable and high-performance Fibre Channel connectivity required to capitalize on enterprise-wide data sharing and collaboration.
- IBM’s virtualization products can help optimize SAP storage environments, with products such as the IBM System Storage SAN Volume Controller, which helps boost IT productivity by creating a single point of control, administration and security for combining storage capacity from multiple vendors into a single reservoir of capacity. SVC transforms existing storage environments by improving utilization, reducing energy and function costs, and delaying need for additional storage disk purchases, while improving ROI.
- IBM General Parallel File System (GPFS) is designed to consolidate file systems across Linux® and UNIX® servers, providing a common pool of file space that can be shared across platforms.
- The IBM System Storage Productivity Center (SSPC) and IBM TotalStorage Productivity Center (TPC) allow the entire storage system management process to take place from a single, centralized console that is designed to help reduce the effort of managing complex, heterogeneous storage infrastructures, improve storage capacity utilization, and improve administrative efficiency. IBM TotalStorage Productivity Center for Fabric provides support for heterogeneous SAN fabrics including Brocade, Cisco, McDATA, QLogic and Emulex switches with end-to-end performance management.
- Softek data mobility technology can help SAP IT users move data, non-disruptively, across storage vendor platforms and operating system environments.
- Storage software
- The IBM Tivoli® software solution portfolio is designed to offer complete coverage of all SAP elements.
- Storage management modules, including IBM Tivoli Storage Manager (TSM), are designed to automate backup and recovery policies to help promote business continuity, simplify storage management and accelerate ROI.
- IBM’s SAP-certified point-in-time TSM for Advanced Copy Services offers Flash Backup, Flash Restore, and Flash Cloning all in the same solution.
- Security modules, including Tivoli Identity Manager and Tivoli Access Manager for e-business, can help mitigate risks and enforce policies consistently while reducing administration costs.
- IBM System Storage Proven Program and SAP solutions
- The IBM System Storage Proven program is designed to help clients identify business partner storage solutions that have been pre-qualified for interoperability with IBM System Storage products. Numerous SAP solutions have been tested with IBM storage solutions, including the full SAP Business Suite, SAP ERP and SAP Advanced Planning and Optimization 3.0. IBM helps take the guesswork out of putting a total solution together to help simplify your purchase decision, freeing you to focus on running your business. Additional SAP solutions are listed in the ISV solutions resource library.
