Storage equipment vendor Inrange Technologies last week announced an adapter that lets its ESCON-based storage-area network switches connect to ESCON and FICON devices.
The IN-VSN Fibre Channel Port Adapter works with the company's CD/9000 ESCON directors and connects FICON devices to the director-level switch.
According to market research firm IDC, up to 70% of corporate data exists on legacy mainframe systems, most of which use storage networks based on the IBM ESCON storage protocol. Although many users intend to migrate to FICON when it is generally available, they will still have a variety of ESCON-based devices that want to connect in.
Using the IN-VSN adapter, up to 128 new FICON and ESCON ports can be added to existing or new Inrange CD/9000 256-port ESCON directors without taking the system down.
The IN-VSN Fibre Channel Port Adapter will be available in January. Prices are not yet available.
Inrange: www.inrange.com
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