HP will offer new low-cost integrated storage hardware to small and medium-sized firms from September

HP is planning a major release of new integrated storage hardware priced from $5,000 to $10,000 (£2,700 to £5,400).

The new kit is expected to be formally launched in September, but Bob Schultz, senior vice-president and general manager of HP network storage solutions, has briefed UK press and customers on some of the details. Schultz said it is still too early to disclose technical specifications or prices, but HP will take a new approach to serving small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

“Customers in that market have special needs,” said Schultz. “They need reliable, simple, affordable products, and they don’t have the IT infrastructure to handle complex storage systems. They want better integrated and easy-to-use systems, priced consistently with the class of servers that they are buying, which are usually in the $5,000 to $10,000 range.”

Schultz said that the emphasis would be on ease of use. “We think it’ll be very significant – an integrated storage system that’s much easier to set up, install and run,” he added. “We won’t talk about it as SAN or NAS [network-attached storage] or direct-attached storage, it will be all of the above.”

Schultz said that talk about components and technologies such as Sata disks and iSCSI networks puts off many customers. “For the SME, that’s what scares them,” he added. “Direct-attached storage is complicated when you have four or five servers, and backup and data protection is a challenge for people at every level.”

The new storage options will include data protection and will allow staff to incorporate tape backups, Schultz added.

HP’s latest move follows a major announcement by Seagate earlier this month, when the disk giant announced a range of hard disk options, including the DB35 Series drive, which offers a huge 750GB capacity per mechanism. Seagate also announced an 8GB Pocket hard drive, and 500GB and 300GB eSata external hard drives.