That's not unusual. Every now and then I have similar exchanges with vendors, but what struck me was that our conversation was focused mainly on iSCSI products and almost ignored the successful FC (Fibre Channel) line the vendor also carries.

Why was this vendor so centered on its bargain-priced iSCSI line and paying so little attention to its boutique-priced FC products? No doubt because iSCSI solutions have more appeal for SME (small and midsize enterprise) customers -- emphasis on small -- and that's the market niche that's driving the big growth in storage sales, according to just about any analyst, pundit, and storage shaman you might want to talk to.

The name of the vendor? I am not telling, sorry, and it really doesn't matter because nearly every storage name you can think of -- including the likes of EMC, HP, IBM, and NetApp, to name a noteworthy few -- is working to bring home more SME business. This week you can add two more names to that list, Pillar Data Systems and Xiotech, both of which have announced new storage solutions for entry-level customers.

You may remember that Pillar Data's Axiom (http://www.infoworld.com/article/05/06/16/25OPstorinside_1.html) combines a rather unique architecture with specialized boxes that apply some neat tricks to boost control, performance, and capacity. The new offering for entry-level customers maintains the same architecture, and it's still based on AxiomONE software, but scales "only" to 24TB.

To lower the entry-level price for SME customers, Pillar Data offers a choice of SATA or FC drives and includes a different packaging of AxiomONE. Basic management features are included, but more advanced functionality such as capacity planning, replication, and snapshots are optionally available at additional cost.