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Iomega's New Unix (Optional) NAS Appliance

Posted by timothy on from the optional-factory-installed-options-optional dept.

Tora writes: "Zip disk maker Iomega has released a sexy new 1U Network Attached Storage server with an option for either Unix or Microsoft Windows as the OS. Their previous NAS offering was Windows-only; it is nice to see both OS options available, although they do not yet have pricing up for the Windows version."

2 of 198 comments (clear)

  1. It's too bad Iomega is dying anyway by b.foster · · Score: 4, Informative
    One of my college buddies took a job at Iomega after graduation because it was an up-and-coming company - back in its heydey, most new PCs came with a shiny Zip100 drive next to the floppy, and times were good. Iomega used to be one of the tech world's few great innovators - and the Jaz concept was pure genius, especially compared with the primitive Bernoulli boxes that Jaz superceded.

    Unfortunately, times have been tough for Iomega. They haven't posted a profit for several years. On a related note, they haven't come up with a decent new product for several years. Instead of innovating, they tried to get into the business of producing cheap, commodity devices (like tape drives and CD writers) that nobody was interested in buying. Coupled with the Click of Death problems, this new strategy backfired and sent Iomega into the red - where they have remained ever since.

    And that brings me to my story: I talked to my buddy on the phone a few weeks ago, and he said that morale is low at Iomega. The company has been slashing jobs and pay every quarter, and he has had to lay off many of his subordinates. He said that the NAS idea is a last-ditch effort to squeeze profits out of a dying industry, and that Iomega's business plan is to sell the NAS devices at a loss (to stay competitive with the big guys) and to sell overpriced support contracts to try to stay in business. For his sake I hope it works out, but for all intents and purposes Iomega is dead. But nobody said that mormons have any business sense anyway, so I don't blame them.

    /B.

  2. Re:Good. by Wesley+Felter · · Score: 4, Informative

    Nope; NetApp implements snapshots using copy-on-write, so they consume less disk space, take effectively no time to create, and are atomic with respect to filesystem operations (so there won't be any problems if you're accessing the filesystem while the snapshot is in progress). Check out their File System Design for an NFS File Server Appliance white paper for the technical details if you're interested.