OMG YES THAT IS RIGHT! Yea.. You have the opportunity to win a free pass! Be sure to click on the link(s) provided (Tip: the big picture is the same link!)

This will take you to not only the rules of engagement (which I’ve hijacked here…. ;)) but takes you through each of the steps of what you need to DO TO WIN!!!  I definitely encourage you to do it.  I mean cmon, one of the best conferences of this year in VEGAS OMG VEGAS and you could WIN! Start EMC World as a winner, and I won’t make any Charlie Sheen references (I refuse to!)  So, act now or forever hold your peace! :)

Win a FREE CUSTOMER PASS to EMC World this year

Rules of engagement

• Contest is open till end of day 22nd of April
• A winner, randomly picked from the pool of entries, will be announced on 25th April, 2011
• The winner will be contacted by a Unified Storage community administrator
• This offer is not applicable to EMC Employees
• EMC World Pass is non-transferrable and cannot be redeemed for cash. This does not include travel, expenses and hotel accommodations.

HOW TO ENTER

     1) Become a registered member of our Unified Storage EMC Community Network and answer this simple question on our discussion:

What are the top 3 sessions at EMC World that you will attend if you win the free pass?

To access agenda of sessions at EMC World, visit www.emcworld.com

• Answering this question in the discussion tab, will get you FIVE entries into this drawing
  

FOR THREE ADDITIONAL ENTRIES

     2) Become a fan of our VNX and VNXe Facebook page  

• Liking our Face book page, will get you ONE additional entry into this drawing

     3) Follow VNX and VNXe on Twitter

• For theTwitter accounts you follow, you will get ONE additional entry each into the drawing
  

Maximum entries into the drawing per participant = 8

OMG! It is THAT time of year again! Are you going to EMC World?  This is definitely the MUST attend event of the year!  (Seriously, you have no idea :))

However, my first call to action for you guys.. is to try to make sure you’re getting hooked up with the FREEBIES if you know you’re going to be going anyway!

A basic chart breaking down what you’re looking at when it comes time to register:

Conference Registration Rates and Breakdowns:

So I decided to take as best of a dive as I could into what these “Special Gifts” are, just to get an idea of what incentive you have to book early (and often?!)

Early Bird Registration Gifts:

Booking your hotel:

Within the Venetian Resort you have the option to select your room to be within the Venetian Tower or the Palazzo Tower. Both towers are equal distance to the conference center. To secure a special conference rate be sure to reference EMC World if you chose to make a phone reservation. All room blocks expire on April 14, 2011.

I cannot emphasize enough because I know a lot of you guys… wait until the day OF the show to book your hotel rooms :)   All Room blocks (at these two hotels) will expire on April 14th, 2011 for this rate.   So just take that to heart when it comes time to book and buy your tickets :)

This is going to be quite the OMG WTF AMAZING EMC World on record, far greater than you can imagine.  And it will ALSO be in Vegas, so if that means a lot to you, further mad crazy times – But in all seriousness, the type of content, the audience, the community, EVERY instance of the value which will come from this event.. this is a MUST attend EMC World.  You think records were broken at our Launch Event on January 18th?  Well, you haven’t seen nothing yet? (Is that grammatically correct?!? :))

What, who, why, Justify to my boss! –

What – (2011 Conference Topics and beyond!)

• Backup, Recovery and Archiving
  Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery
  Cloud Computing
  Content Management and Archiving
  Enterprise Applications and Databases
  Mainframe Platforms
  Partner Solutions
  Security and Compliance
  Storage and IT Management
  Technology Directions and Innovation
  Tiered Storage and Automation
  Virtual Infrastructure

Who – (Meet, Greet, Network, Learn)

• Learn directly from EMC engineers, customers, and partners at 500+ breakout sessions. EMC World’s comprehensive agenda includes keynotes, lectures, live demonstrations, hands-on workshops, and birds-of-a-feather sessions.

Did I mention I’m going to be there?! :) And definitely seek me out and I can hook you up with other like-minded individuals, or others who are either doing what you WANT to do, or have already done it and you can share best practices (No, not marketing fluff, but actual real customers, engineers and beyond, networking seeds networking! :))

Why – (Content, Content, Content)

• Challenge your expertise with offerings including tutorials, business tracks, technical training, and developer sessions ranging from novice to expert.

Are you a novice looking to seed your knowledge? Excellent.  Are you an expert, guru, ninja, and you find that no one understands you? Go yell at engineers! (That’s what I do ;))   This is the perfect opportunity whether you’re at the top of your game or just getting involved in the industry.   No stone unturned, you will be able to enhance your knowledge, take things to a new level and become an even greater champion than you already are today! (Champions ARE made just by attending EMC World)  Literally, seek me out and I’ll make sure you’re getting the MOST out of your entire experience – I do it at every show I attend. ;)

Justify to my boss – (Whoa, this is in Vegas, my boss won’t approve that!)

I haven’t seen an official write up ‘slick’ on this yet, so I am writing this FOR you.  I’ve had to do this in the past for past events (VMworld, Microsoft TechEd, Past EMC Worlds, TEC, etc)   You go to your management and you scream “I want to learn, I want to educate myself in order to better drive value into the environment, I need to network with my peers, and see the up and coming and be PART of the future instead of waiting for us to eventually get there”.   Yea, but this is what your management sees. “Jim wants to go to Vegas for a week, blah blah blah conference”  

Do you find yourself in this situation?  If so, let me know (And let others know) I’ll try to make sure you have the right resources to help PROVE this out in your environment.  Whether you’re an EMC Customer today, or one in the future; this will be the value of a life time.   If you spent the entire time in sessions never meeting a single person you will gain benefit and an experience which will pay dividends in your home environment; step outside that shell a little bit and all of a sudden you will become a champion unlike that you’ll ever have seen!  

Do not hesitate to educate! I’ll personally call your management if you’d like and help them understand the value (I’ll get whoever your local account team is involved just to make sure I’m not blindsiding them ;))   But seriously, now is the time to SAVE, as well as to LEARN!   Hop to it!

So, good luck, enjoy and lets all meet up in Vegas for what will be an experience of a life time, this is ground breaking in every possible fashion!  

I’m sure by now you’ve read the VERY good articles about the VNXe such as:

• VNXe: Cherry Bomb! (StorageZilla Mark Twomey)
• Introducing The VNX Family (Chuck Hollis)
• VNXe (Steve Todd)
• VNXe = incredible things.. in tiny, transformer-like packages! (Chad Sakac)

Well, as typically promised.. here is my EXPOSE’ Or however you want to look at it, because I try to see these things through your ever careful eyes to wonder behind the scenes just EXACTLY what may be going on!

Disclaimer: I’m not sure how much of this I’m supposed to share, so I’ll deal with the fall-out and you enjoy the content :)

Let’s Get Physical [Physical Specifications]

This looks pretty straight forward – It’s VERY clear on exactly what is going on with these systems (Well, sort of)  I want to draw your attention to a few things so we’ll all be on the same page!  

• Note the different drive enclosures between the VNXe3100 and the VNXe3300 – 12×3.5” in 2U and 15×3.5” in 3U
• The CPU/Memory is PER Controller with each model able to support up to 2 controllers [VNXe3300 is 2 controllers by default]
• It’s not covered in these Physical Specifications; but I feel it important to call out Max # of drives and DAEs
  • VNXe3100 Single Controller 48 drives, VNXe3100 Dual Controller 96 drives; VNXe3300 120 drives

Are you Flexible? [FLEX IO Module Options]

Also fairly straight forward right! – Only thing I’d like to point out is the support for 10GBe on the VNXe3300!

It’s a DISK DAE! [Supported disk Add-on Enclosures (DAES) – Supported Disk Drives]

Here it breaks it down for you, the differences between the DAEs available (You’ll note that these are all 15K or 7.2K [other than the Flash] – The VNX has a 2.5” DAE which supports 10K drives but not in the VNXe – Just so you don’t go “whoa! Where are the 10Ks at?!” :))   – There are more details and more located in the Specification Sheet: EMC VNXe Series Unified Storage Systems

Save More with Packaging! [EMC VNXe Series Software Packs]

I spent some time last week going through simulations on cost benefit analysis (blah blah blah) of building configurations with the Suites (and packs) and with simply requesting each item on their own – to see what the pricing would look like: Truth be told; OMG THE PACKAGES WORK – It’s actually EASIER to simply choose a suite than it is to play games and say “I’d only like the potatoes but please leave out the application protection suite”  So, make it easier on yourself and try to build the full package into your future instead of trying to piecemeal together a configuration and a solution, your data will be happier for it! :)   There are more details on these packages in the Data Sheet: EMC VNXe Series Software Packs

Hopefully this helps you get a better understanding of some of the details you frankly REALLY want to know when it comes to understanding this platform a little better.    If you’re looking to go even deeper, let me know and I’ll take the conversation there in a future blog post!    Thanks! Hope you find this useful!

Here are some rocking VNXe documents!   (Powerlink required – If any links do not work… Yea, I wasn’t supposed to share that then :))

• Data Sheet: EMC VNXe Series
• Data Sheet: EMC VNXe Series Software Packs
• Data Sheet: EMC VNX Series Total Efficiency Pack
• Specification Sheet: EMC VNXe Series Unified Storage Systems
• Customer Presentation: EMC VNXe Series
• Top 10 Reasons Why Customers Deploy Microsoft Applications with Hyper-V on EMC VNXe
• Top 10 Reasons Why Customers Deploy Microsoft Applications with VMware vSphere Essentials on EMC VNXe

Wow, that’s a pretty grand claim, right? (Am I right?!?) But let’s think about it.

Oh and I’d be remiss to mention the MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT which has been long awaited for so long – The announcement of the VNX and VNXe systems!   But you’ll find out more in due course I’m sure! (I’ll be sure of that!)

I couldn’t wait to share this with you though.  You guys have seen Unisphere right? (I’ve talked about it in the Past for managing Celerra) But now is the motherlode as it were – Taking the Management experience to an entirely new level!

I totally stole this demo – But I couldn’t hold back from sharing this with you! 

I don’t know about you, but I hate arid (Yes, DRY) demos which feel so over produced you lose the content in the rhetoric, But this demo truly seems to exceed that.   Watch this demo and you will not only find yourself saving time using this tool, frankly.. you’ll even find yourself get younger, reclaiming those lost years spent in ugly and mismanaged ‘management tools’.   This truly works FOR you instead of against you!

I love you VNXe Unisphere :)