Last week saw the latest in a series of product trades as Overland Storage acquired the storied Snap Server line of network attached storage devices from Adaptec for $3.6 million.

As many as 200,000 Snap Servers have shipped into the SMB market, which IDC estimates to be $1.2 billion in size. Overland will add the Snap Server to its line of SAN-based disk products. On Overland’s site right now, the Snap Servers occupy their own spot under NAS Data Protection.

The Snap Servers have had a number of previous owners, who tried to make a go of the business. They originally shipped in 1998 from Meridian Data. Meridian was acquired by Quantum in December 1999 for $85 million. Once again, Snap Servers was acquired by private investors for $11 million and became Snap Appliance.

Culminating this whole affair – so everyone thought – was Adaptec’s acquisition of Snap Appliance for $100 million in 2004.

Snap Servers brought Adaptec $18 million in revenue a year. And so now Overland has a chance at the product line.

Among the Snap Servers Overland picked up are the Snap Server 110, 210, 410, 520 and 650, as well as its Enterprise Data Replication (EDR) products.

Overland will pay $2.1 million cash on closing the transaction with the remainder in 12 months.

Deni Connor is principal analyst for Storage Strategies NOW.