(Work) Here I Go Again...

[SirFozzie]

No, thankfully not "Here I go again on my own.." (which is a good thing in this economy)more like "Here I Go Again" back to my roots.

I work as a tech support engineer for a pretty large database storage company (several of you know which one), in one of their mid-range lines (Mid-range meaning being "only" a quarter of a million or so for a decent product).

I like what I do, the work is challenging, the customers aren't TOO dumb (you don't get many "CD-Rom=Coaster" folks at this level. Well, that's about to change.

A while back, they asked me if I wouldn't mind being loaned out to another department. This department used to be mixed in with our product (as part of a backup to (Virtual) Tape solution), but expanded beyond our product to be part of our top-range product as well. I had training in the product in its early stages (very basic, Technican level training), but nothing in the advanced stuff. And what stuff I knew is well since out of date (to put in comparison, this group and mine were seperated right before the software went 2.0, the code level's at 3.2 now, and we work with a LOT higher products, so much so they had to change the name of the product)

I had no problem with this, it never hurts to be willing to help other departments out and pick up knowledge (it makes you a safer bet to be picked up if your tech support position ever gets outsourced or otherwise eliminated). They truly need the help too.. they have about the same level of cases my group does, and about half the people.

Today, I find out, it's not going to be a short term loan. In fact, It would be easier to call this a permanent move. It's a bit worrying, going from a product you know a lot about to something you are a lot lower level trained on. The good news is that even though I'm going to be headed back to a first shift area while I'm getting trained back up to speed, I will still get my second shift bonus (I'm a night owl, and eventually be back on a 2nd or a third shift).

So it's going to be interesting times (in the chinese curse kind of way, I guess). But reminds me of the line how one should never volunteer for anything

[DaddyTorgo]

hey - first shift hours with a second shift bonus - good deal!

[rjolley]

Fozzie, which company do you work for? Would be nice to know someone in support for a product I may work with.

[SirFozzie]

Originally Posted by rjolley

Fozzie, which company do you work for? Would be nice to know someone in support for a product I may work with.

EMC. I currently work on these products

CLARiiON - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

and will be working on this product:

Disk Library Family - Backup and Recovery - EMC

[rjolley]

Ah, yes, I work as a DBA (mainly Oracle, but can handle others) and that is definitely a product I've come across.

Nice to meet ya.

[Sun Tzu]

Goin down the only road I've ever known.

Like a drifter I was born to walk alone.

But i've made up my mind...

[jeff061]

You and your expensive "mid-level" storage . Give me some recommendations on EMC products that compete with EVA 4400, or Netapp FAS2050, if they exist .

Got a lot of money(relatively) on my budget this year for storage and I've begun dialing up my SAN research.

Probably a good move by the way, diversify your knowledge and keep things fresh. Personally my main professional goal has always been to avoid stagnation.

[SirFozzie]

and they ain't wastin no more time. (informed on Friday, probably start on Monday)

[rjolley]

jeff, have you looked at 3PAR? We used it at my last just and it seemed like a solid SAN.

[Comey]

Originally Posted by Sun Tzu

Goin down the only road I've ever known.

Like a drifter I was born to walk alone.

But i've made up my mind...

Dammit.

[CamEdwards]

I've finally met someone who uses parentheses more than I do (and that's saying a lot).

[Raiders Army]

Originally Posted by jeff061

Probably a good move by the way, diversify your knowledge and keep things fresh. Personally my main professional goal has always been to avoid stagnation.

That's what I was thinking as well.

Oh yeah, we can probably get our NOFL game in easier too!

[Galaxy]

(Whitesnake).

[rjolley]

Fozzie, or anyone else, do you have any stats on the performance of different RAID schemes besides the usual "good for reading, bad for writing" recommendations? I had a discussion with my manager about RAID schemes for databases and we agreed that 1+0 was a very good, though most expensive, scheme, but he thought up that 0+1 performs better and is preferred, even though the fault tolerance is worse.

Any help in finding out how 1+0 and 0+1 perform would be helpful, and any info on the performance of all of the RAID schemes would be great.

[SirFozzie]

A lot depends on the stripe size and the size and type of your reads (Random or sequential). Generally, you want to get as many spindles as possible involved in your reads or writes (the disk is the slowest part of any read/write activity)

David

(Who's been setting up his new desk etcetera all morning)

[gstelmack]

My experience with RAID so far has mostly been that when my work machine crashes and I have to power it down and back up again, I'm screwed out of working for 2 to 3 hours while it rebuilds the RAID mirror, thus sucking all my disk access out the window...

[Subby]

you should make this into a dynasty!

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by gstelmack

thus sucking all my disk access out the window...

This is too easy, right?