Xsigo announced the availability of an enhanced version of the company's VP780 I/O Director. The enhanced product, called the VP780 x2, is designed to set new performance and ease-of-use standards for data center customers using virtual I/O technologies.

The new VP780 x2 offers all the benefits of its predecessor -- greater data center agility, up to 50% less capital cost, and 70% fewer cables -- now with a 100% increase in server connectivity speed. The VP780 x2 delivers 20Gbs of bandwidth to each server, making it the world's fastest converged I/O fabric. The product also offers features that allow users to quickly monitor and manage their I/O topology with a single view that extends from the virtual machines to the physical switch ports.

"While others are talking about emerging I/O virtualization (IOV) solutions, Xsigo continues to execute on virtualized data center solutions that combine IOV and converged I/O networks in a comprehensive end-to-end solution," said Greg Schulz, founder and senior analyst of StorageIO. "Building on their installed customer base and proven technology, Xsigo enables organizations to now begin the migration to next-generation green and virtual data centers, so more useful work can be done in a smaller footprint. The savings in power, cooling, floor space and cabling results in less management complexity and lower overall cost."

"As IT managers migrate to next-generation virtualized data centers, they need solutions for the I/O performance and management issues that virtualization creates," said Lloyd Carney, CEO of Xsigo. "Our new offering tackles these issues with innovative I/O management tools and new performance capabilities that will help our customers architect best-in-class data centers."

The enhanced data center I/O management capabilities of the VP780 x2 include a single-screen view of virtual machines, virtual switches and I/O topologies. This view enables end-to-end visualization of resources extending from the virtual machine to a physical switch port. Enhanced performance monitoring now includes traffic statistics accessible through third party tools. The faster server connection speed delivers greater throughput and increased VMotion performance for faster deployment of virtual resources.

Also new in the VP780 x2 are enhanced SAN and iSCSI boot capabilities that allow users to boot any server from any Fibre Channel or iSCSI LUN for fast re-purposing of server resources. Customers can now adapt to dynamic workloads, deploy resources on demand, and boost utilization by rapidly changing both a server's I/O personality and its application workload, all within the Xsigo virtual I/O environment.

Xsigo is a vendor that combines virtual I/O technology, a unified fabric, and a hardware-based platform to deliver data center-wide scalability and a single point of management for all I/O resources. Xsigo launched its first virtual I/O product in September of 2007 specifically to address the I/O complexity and performance bottlenecks found in today's data centers. Xsigo consolidates the I/O infrastructure and replaces physical network and storage interfaces (NICs and HBAs) with virtual resources that are remotely manageable from a single console. The Xsigo solution works with today's existing infrastructure, and incorporates a modular design that is easily adapted to accommodate new networks, servers, and interconnect standards.