EMC Corp, Hopkinton, Massachusetts is not hanging around waiting for IBM Corp to make up its mind that its large-scale disk arrays for mainframes really are ready to go, and yesterday it took its own mainframe storage offerings into the stratosphere with the launch of the Symmetrix 5500-9, 5200-9 and 5200-3, the -9 models using Seagate Technology Inc’s new 9Gb 5.25 drive. It says that the biggest, which stores 1Tb, takes up 17 square feet of floor space, slightly more than an average desk. The systems use EMC’s Symmetrix technology, so current EMC customers can add on new disk drives to their Symmetrix systems already in place, and protect their investments. EMC expects the new products to start to have an impact on its total revenues in the third and fourth quarters of this year, and while IBM is now expected finally to launch by mid-year, EMC is now so well established in the market that it is beginning to look as if IBM will be trying to play catch-up as it did with tape libraries. EMC gave no prices or specs for the new Integrated Cached Disk Arrays.
