The WHIPTAIL INVICTA storage array will complement Softcat’s incumbent capacity storage tier of 100 per cent spinning disk and will fuel the VAR’s managed service for VDI, database and other high performance applications that require high input/outputs per second of READ and WRITE data, throughput and minimised latency. Softcat selected WHIPTAIL after aggressively evaluating several other major suppliers, including other all-Flash vendors, but WHIPTAIL outperformed the competition on performance tests and ease of scalability. As the VMware reseller of the year experiences rapid and continual growth, these are all critical elements to its ongoing success.
“Softcat has been working with WHIPTAIL since early 2011 on a number of in-house virtualisation and VDI projects for our customers, but it was time to practice what we preach – in both senses of the word!” said Sam Routledge, Solutions Director at Softcat. “WHIPTAIL is very highly regarded by our customers, as it makes truly high performance storage a reality and for many, it has transformed the way their businesses operate. WHIPTAIL de-risks VDI deployments by eradicating the most risky element of such a project; poor performance, which inevitably leads to user dissatisfaction.”
Simon Walker, Managed Services Director at Softcat added: “Softcat has worked hard to build a virtualisation practice that is second to none; we are now looking to replicate this success with our managed services team, and the deployment of WHIPTAIL is a key element to this future success.”
The WHIPTAIL INVICTA silicon storage array scales to 72TB and in performance tests has achieved 650,000 READ IOPs and 550,000 WRITE IOPs, with over 7GB bandwidth and <0.2ms latency. WHIPTAIL leads the way in Flash-based storage, being the first to widely adopt MLC NAND flash and making it enterprise ready. WHIPTAIL offers a seven year drive wear endurance guarantee, through wear-leveling technology implemented within its RACE RUNNER operating system, instilling customer confidence when deploying Flash storage.
Dave Johnson, Channel Manager at WHIPTAIL EMEA said: “Softcat is the leading WHIPTAIL reseller in the UK and this project will help to propel our relationship further and continue to build upon this success.”
Brian Feller, VP and GM of WHIPTAIL EMEA concluded: “It is always a testament to our company and our technology when we are trusted by world-class visionary companies such as Softcat, not only to partner with them, but also to be adopted as a key element of their managed service arm.”