New Scalable Exchange Server 2010 Solution from HP
It is pretty exciting to see HP release a new hardware solution that provides a simple scalable solution to build the smallest and largest Exchange deployments. This new solution maps closely to the architectural building block concept that I’ve written about in the past - Blog Post: Exchange Mailbox Storage Bricks
I think what is most exciting about this is the general direction that HP is taking towards storage. They are building a platform that allows you to build very large Exchange deployments that at the core are essentially the same as what you would build for a 500 or 1000 person company and just multiplied x times. The platform has the advantages of low cost, simplicity of scale-out, and consistency of hardware (once you have validated your first block in the deployment you know that when you add your 20th block, Exchange will run just as well on the first block and the last). Also, since HP has already done the sizing and validation for a given user profile and you have access to all the test procedures and results there is an additional scale benefit: much of that work gets done once by HP not once per deployment.
That last scale advantage also applies to all the pre-configuration that HP has done for the solution. This work makes sure that the best practices that the Exchange team recommends are implemented correctly (for example: storage parameters configured when creating LUNs and static ports for MAPI). So the solution is ready 'in-the-box' and it will even run ExBPA for you after deployment so you can be sure that everything is complete and ready for users.
This work is part of a long term partnership with HP. While I am very excited to see this solution and the degree it embraces our storage story, I am even more excited about the work this partnership is going to produce down the road.
Here are some links describing the new HP solution in detail:
Perry