Tewksbury, Mass.-headquartered Avid Technology (NASDAQ: AVID) unveiled its new shared-storage system, Avid Unity ISIS, last week in New York. Six years in the making, the inventive new technology introduces Avid’s new distributed architecture model for managing data, as well as other patent-pending features.
First impressions from the editorial community demonstrated that the high level of reliability promised in the technology is very important to Avid customers. Those who are planning for an HD future saw limitation in the fact that it is presently unable to support uncompressed HD, but still other post execs did not view this as a drawback.
For many in Avid’s target market, HD may not be an issue as the “enterprise class” companies that the company hopes to reach include broadcast news and network production operations, reality TV productions and educational institutions, as well as post houses.
THE TECHNOLOGY
Infinitely Scalable Intelligent Storage (ISIS) leverages what Avid calls a “distributed-intelligence” architecture, meaning that it enables 16 individual storage blades — housed within a single storage chassis (Avid ISIS Engine) — to process media, while simultaneously sharing data and balancing the collective workflow between entire groups of connected storage drives. The drive blades are able to adapt instantly and redistribute data in the event of a drive failure.
Version 1.0 of Avid Unity ISIS comes with the ability to link multiple Avid ISIS Engines to one another, as well as connectivity of up to 100 clients working in real-time over standard Gigabit Ethernet, meaning that any compression schemes that fits that bandwidth can be used–that includes Avid DNxHD but not uncompressed HD. Other version 1.0 features including native compatibility with leading Ethernet switching technologies; and the flexibility to hot-swap any storage component — even in the midst of data transfer — to ensure uninterrupted access to information for all users within a facility.
“For customers that require the 24/7 reliability and availability, this is the first system that we can talk about with no single point of failure in terms of hardware and software components, meaning there is a level of redundancy different from any other storage system available,” explained Andy Dale, senior product manager, storage and networking.
ISIS enables a real-time collaborative workflow using Avid’s latest systems such as Adrenaline, as well as Meridien-based Media Composers (ABVS is not supported). When asked about third-party systems, Avid president/CEO David Krall explained, “We have not qualified for real time any third-party systems. That said, you should be able to use them in a push/pull environment.
Beta sites include television and commercial post house Avi-Drome, based in Hilversum, the Netherlands. “As an Avid Unity ISIS beta tester, we have been very impressed with the system’s ability to handle the storage capacity we have come to need,” said Avi-Drome founder Bart -Jan van Genderen. “We intend to build a central-server environment with Avid Unity ISIS by connecting a multitude of client systems to the server. This will enable us to handle five times more work for our clients than before with fewer people, which translates into more projects and more business.”
He told SHOOT that he has started testing non-Avid tools on the network, and expected that they would be able to develop that workflow.
ISIS is a new member to the Unity family, which also includes Unity LANshare and Unity Media Network; these are not upgradeable to the new system. ISIS Version 1.0 starts at $106,995 and includes 8 TB of storage. Storage may be added in increments of 8 TB, each for an additional $90,000.
REACTIONS
Following the announcement, SHOOT took an informal poll of reactions.
“The level of redundancy is great; it’s a very nice architecture,” said Rich Torpey, VP of engineering at New York-based Rhinoceros. “I do have a concern where their primary I/O is Gigabite Ethernet. For post, the Gigabit Ethernet is a big limitation. We are doing a lot of HD and that would be our primary interest. But unless we can use multiple Gigabit Ethernet ports tied together–port aggregation–you can’t use it for uncompressed HD.”
Meanwhile, New York-based PS 260 partner/editor John Zieman was focused on reliability. “It sounds like a leap ahead,” said Zieman, whose PS 260 has seven Avid Adrenaline systems running on an Avid Unity LANshare. “If Avid delivers the same reliability that is the hallmark of their previous system, then this is the thing to beat. Unity LANshare’s been relatively bulletproof. That becomes really crucial when [a storage system] can take down every room in the house.”
Unlike Torpey, Zieman did not view the resolution limitations as an issue and explained that PS 260 follows a more traditional editorial model and does not do online from its Avid Adrenalines. “More crucial than anything [for PS 260] is reliability,” he emphasized.
Optimus, with bases in Chicago and Santa Monica, is also a happy Unity LANshare owner. “Unity is probably one of the industry’s best technologies of the last few years. How did we live without it?,” said Optimus president Tom Duff.
When asked his first impression of ISIS, Duff said, “It depends on what you want to do with it–At this point HD is not a concern; right now we finish out of our Avid in SD.”