Seamless, affordable access to fixed content.

Centera provides a simple, scalable, secure storage solution for cost-effective retention, protection, and disposition of a wide range of fixed content-including X-rays, voice archives, electronic documents, e-mail archives, check images, and CAD/CAM designs. Exceptional performance, seamless integration, and proven reliability make Centera the online enterprise archiving standard for virtually any application and data type.

Optimized for regulatory compliance.

The first magnetic disk-based WORM device, Centera facilitates compliance with the most stringent regulatory requirements. It is the optimal solution for fixed content, providing functionality not available in tape, optical, or traditional disk solutions-at a lower total cost of ownership.

This integrated hardware and software system supports Microsoft Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows 2003 Server, and Windows XP Professional-as well as Solaris, Linux, HP-UX, UNIX, iSeries, and z/OS mainframe platforms. It delivers:

Simple management.

With Centera, your applications no longer have to track the physical location of stored information. Instead, Centera creates a unique identifier, based on the attributes of the content, which applications can use for retrieval.

Assured authenticity.

Centera gives each stored object a unique content address, derived from the content itself-to assure content integrity and authenticity. No duplicates of the same content are ever stored. And you can choose the data protection option that's best for your deployment: content protection mirroring or, for up to 25 percent more usable capacity, Centera's new content protection parity.

Universal access.

The Centera CAS API enables native integration with over 300 applications from EMC's Centera Partners. Use the powerful new Centera Universal Access software appliance to access and archive non-integrated applications via standard NFS, CIFS, HTTP, and FTP file interfaces. Choose Basic, Retention, and Enhanced Availability versions to meet your retention needs. And the new Bus-Tech Mainframe Appliance for Storage (MAS)-a seamless tape emulation gateway-lets you connect your z/OS mainframe applications via ESCON and FICON.

Scalability without reconfiguration.

Centera's architecture is based on redundant arrays of independent nodes (RAIN)-offering petabyte scalability. Adding capacity is easy: Centera auto-discovers and configures the new capacity as it's installed.

Self-healing.

Centera continuously monitors to detect and repair soft errors. It also automatically reconfigures itself and replicates objects as necessary if hardware failures occur-such as disks or nodes-which are automatically reported through EMC's remote monitoring system.

Business continuity protection and efficient replication.

When using content mirroring protection, all information objects are asynchronously mirrored within a local Centera cluster to support automatic recovery from component failures. Centera also can be configured to replicate and maintain duplicate copies of fixed content at a remote site to guard against site disaster by using Centera's remote replication software.

Easy installation and non-disruptive upgrades.

Install or upgrade Centera in under an hour, without disrupting content access. Centera's software operating environment, CentraStar, also can be upgraded non-disruptively as new versions are released.

Future-proof architecture.

Content stored within Centera is location- and hardware-independent-even as technologies evolve, records will continue to remain accessible, independent of the underlying storage medium.