EVA4400: HP StorageWorks EVA Disk Array

The EVA4400 is the entry model of the EVA4400, EVA6400 and EVA8400 family of HP Enterprise Virtual Arrays. HP's EVA 6400/8400 QuickSpecs, which also cover the 4400, put it in a family of three (EVA4400, EVA6400 and EVA8400) that share the 12-bay M6412A disk enclosure and the same family of Fibre Channel disks, namely dual-ported FC solid state drives, high-performance FC disks and FATA disks.

Key specifications from that table: HSV300 controller model, XCS v10.0xx controller software, Command View EVA v9.4 or v10.0 management, and 4GB of cache per controller pair with battery backup for up to 96 hours. LUN size is up to 32TB and the array supports 256 hosts. RAID support covers Vraid 0, 1, 0+1, 5, 0+5 and 6. Host connectivity is Fibre Channel, iSCSI, FCoE and direct connect, and Command View EVA can manage up to 16 EVAs.

Upgrade path: HP's compatibility reference shows a data-in-place upgrade from the EVA4400 controller (HSV300) to the EVA6400 (HSV400) or EVA8400 (HSV450). If you are expanding rather than replacing, that tells you the controllers, not the shelves, are the change.

What to check before ordering: the generation (this array takes M6412A shelves, not the older 14-bay M5314 shelves used by the EVA4000), the controller software level, and that the drives are Fibre Channel or FATA types the array supports. Siblings in this family are EVA6400 and EVA8400, and the 12-bay shelf is the AG638B M6412A enclosure. More parts are on the storage systems hub.