Where is Storage Computer (SOS, RAID-7, Goodlander) now ?

Anyone remember "Storage Computer Corporation"? They had the
unforgettable stock ticker symbol SOS, owned the domain name
storage.com, sold RAID-7 disk arrays (which turned out to be RAID-4
with a write cache, and got the RAB all hot and bothered), and were
owned/operated by Theodore (Ted) Goodlander. Located in New Hampshire
(in the old Digital/Wang area).

They used to be mildly amusing in the mid 90s, when they were going
around selling RAID-7 arrays to VAX sites, claiming that their great
invention of RAID-7 was so much better than anything else - but the
benchmarks they showed was a big disk array compared to a single RA82.
And when people asked what the magic sauce in RAID-7 was, they got
very testy. They used to spam both comp.os.vms and comp.arch.storage
regularly, and the very brash CEO Ted Goodlander used to back up his
sales people in spamming and making inane claims.

The high point of their existance (from a comedy point of view) was
when they filed a patent on pretty much any parity-based RAID scheme
in the 1990s, which was eventually granted (the patent office is
pretty sloppy), and tried to enforce it on people selling RAID-5 disk
arrays. XIOTech I think caved and settled for a few M$ (cheaper than
a lawsuit any day). Then they made the mistake of sueing Hitachi
(HDS, the disk array maker), which went to trial in a European court.
I think one of the original authors of the 89 RAID taxonomy paper
(Gibson/Katz/Patterson) was an expert witness for Hitachi. Storage
Computer had their had handed to them on a platter by the judge, who
if I remember right found the patent to be fraudulent and invalid;
this must have been around 2002-2004 or such.

Then it got really quiet around them. I presume they didn't survive
that blow, since their operations as a disk array company were already
pretty lost. A little web search shows that the domain name is sold,
the stock is de-facto dormant, there are regulatory filings, and the
only news I can find for Ted Goodlander is that he got a permit from
the state of New Hampshire to modify his boat dock in 2007.

Did they go under? Are the principals still involved in anything?
The purpose of my question is purely historical, idle curiosity.

 

never heard of this, but when I hear 'raid 7', I think this place:

http://www.firstsol.com/raid7.html

the specs are fairly amusing.

 

LOL... 5 million bytes per second...


--
Kaktuso jede pod tusem zut pedofilo njise navecer ? By runf

Damir Lukic, calypso@_MAKNIOVO_fly.srk.fer.hr
http://inovator.blog.hr
http://calypso-innovations.blogspot.com/

 

yeah, when even the numbers are small they have to use larger spelled out
words to fill in the space.

 

Yup, funny guys...

--
U zraku se za svaku Novu Godinu zagadjen kurtonog
proizvodija. By runf

Damir Lukic, calypso@_MAKNIOVO_fly.srk.fer.hr
http://inovator.blog.hr
http://calypso-innovations.blogspot.com/

 

Hi!

Check out those pics, it seems that it was 15 years ago. Pretty good for
those days. )

Best regards,

Iggy

 

Oh, you're here too?! )) Cool!

Yeah, I've seen those retro chips on the board in those pictures... In
fact, it is about 20 years old...


--
"Crvens li cetkao pije ?" upita eurokremo podriguje Klintonu ubiju.
"Nisam ja nikog bombardiro !" rece zidara kopa "Ja samo Ivicaog trcija celavm !" By runf

Damir Lukic, calypso@_MAKNIOVO_fly.srk.fer.hr
http://inovator.blog.hr
http://calypso-innovations.blogspot.com/

 

Hi!

Based on those disk sizes, and some other data more 15 than 20. )

In 1994. standard disk in server was between 200 and 500 MB, SCSI.

Best regards,

Iggy

 

In 1994 standard disk in workstations was 2-4 9GB Barracudas.
YMMV depending on your platform and industry.

 

Hi!

Just checked different IBM, Digital and HP product letters from that
time - first 1 GB drive in "ordinary" PC appeared in 1994. (Deskstar XP,
SCSI - November 22nd.). Mainstream ATA appeared late 1995., large
merketed in 1996. 4 GB drives were, at that time, not even a SF item. )

Best regards,

Iggy

 

I know that, but I was kidding with the way it was written... 5 million
bytes per second instead of 5MB/s... Marketing trick...

--
"Madjarskis li skakavaco kolje ?" upita mackaa rascvjetava pederog guzija.
"Ne znam ja nista !" rece Fataa spava "Ja samo romobilu crtu mrsavm !" By runf

Damir Lukic, calypso@_MAKNIOVO_fly.srk.fer.hr
http://inovator.blog.hr
http://calypso-innovations.blogspot.com/

 

Just came across this old thread....

I used to work for Storage Computer (and Mr. Goodlander) back in the early '90s.
There were only a handful of people on board when I joined the company. They had completed development of their product line but had not ramped up manufacturing. I was responsible for establishing the manufactuing process there. For the first six months I was doing everything from Programming PALs in the evening to actually building the storage subsystems on the line for orders. I personally built many of the early systems that were shipped!
Yes, that was the time when Seagate introduced the Barracuda with a wopping 9GB of storage! Since the systems (in addition to the drives) were SCSI we wer able to daisy chain several of them together and one afternoon we built a 1TB system.....just to demonstrate we could hit that milestone! Pretty respectable back in those days.
During my time there, I developed the manufacturing and repair process and managed quarterly revenue growth within manufacturing eventually hitting $3M before I eventually left to go to HP.
I left a bunch of 'starter shares' of SOS on the table when I left and I believe they (the shares) that all of us had never matured to the point where people could cash them in.
Ted had developed this business out of the ashes of his Cab-Tek business which basically built cabinets (by far not high-tech) and initially employed his Cab-Tek folks in this new business (I came from outside).
In my opinion, the business suffered more from the "Entrepreneurial Curse" than anything else. Ted did have a very brash style which, coupled with the tendency to not let others manage, tended to alienate his managers.
At the time, I think they had a very good product and had become 'noticed' by redefining RAID to include Level 7 (as contraversial as that was it got them lots of attention....Ted really loved the contravery and was very passionate about his product). They had great people working there who would go above and beyond to bring in revenue (like most start ups!) but had trouble getting out of second gear and really hitting their stride.

So, there is a view from the inside...... ;-)

Best Regards,
Bob

 

Missing a lot ofacts

"They used to be mildly amusing in the mid 90s, when they were going
around selling RAID-7 arrays to VAX sites, claiming that their great
invention of RAID-7 was so much better than anything else - but the
benchmarks they showed was a big disk array compared to a single RA82."

Not sure why you have come up with all these sour remarks about Ted Goodlander and Storcomp's products. For sure you are totally wrong with most of your "facts". Ted was a very clever man and Storcomp's products was in the 90's quite unique.

_peldon

 

Reading the @KPBC Mary Meeker’s 2015 Internet Trends slides I saw Storage Computer Corporation is listed as having a market cap of $95MM back in 1995 (slide 6).

Wondering what happened to them led me to this thread.

Blackwells Information Services acquired a Storage Computer RAID-7 system in 1998, principally for its revamp of the Blackwells Online Bookshop (BOB). In a separate project I was re-implementing Oracle Financials (version 10.7 to replace 10.6 as the latter wasn't Y2K compliant) and needed a new platform. At the time it made sense to build out the Storage Computer with additional drives. I remember being assured that it could easily handle it and that there were definitely "no single points of failure".

In what turned out to be the *practice* go-live weekend for my project I found at least two, if not three, single points of failure in the Storage Computer RAID-7. That was not a pleasant experience. Their engineers came on site and spent the rest of the day discovering just how deficient their products was.

At least it gave my online bookshop colleagues a heads-up.

-Jim-