Why the February update HPE 3PAR StoreServ - the most important since the launch line
The announcement of the new features of HPE 3PAR StoreServ on February 13, 2017 was named by some commentators on the corporate blog as the most important since launch.
Families 3PAR 7000 four years ago. This is a very loud statement. During this time, much has changed in the industry, flash drives have overtaken hard drives in terms of sales, and some storage companies have lost their independence or even collapsed .
Interestingly, on February 13, only programmatic improvements were announced. The only hardware novelty is the four-port adapters for the 3PAR 8000 family. This is an important thing for those who use File Persona or iSCSI, but does not deserve the title of “the most important announcement”. So what's the deal?
Back in August 2016 and look at the Gartner magic quadrant in all-flash arrays. Despite the fact that HPE was among the leaders with the 3PAR line, many noticed that the company's position was far from the first place (although, judging by sales, HPE 3PAR is the No. 1 array in this segment). At the same time, Gartner analysts noted the strengths of the array - performance, scalability, a set of tools for managing data, and intelligent work with NAND memory. The report even appreciated the fact that HPE 3PAR is the only platform that is present both in the quadrant for all-flash systems and in the quadrant of traditional arrays ( "familiarity and channel partners" ). Analysts thought it was insufficient to put the company in a higher position. Here are the Cautions list:
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As far as these points are critical, one can argue. The implementation of compression in some solutions on the market does not allow convincingly to prove the great benefit of this technology (see the results of last year’s competition , where 3PAR without compression showed the best storage cost in competition with IBM and EMC solutions). The licensing scheme is the concern of presale at the procurement stage, which does not affect the efficiency of the array. As for analytic capabilities, do they have to be in the cloud? To do this, the system must send statistics to the cloud. To many Russian customers, this seems like a bad idea. In addition, it is possible that analysts did not take into account the presence of such an analytical tool as the HPE StoreFront Remote , which we will discuss later .
However, all these "problems" are fixed in the announcement of February 13.
New term in the HPE 3PAR dictionary. This is not just compression, it is a set of measures for the efficient storage of data. It all starts with Zero Detect, when the 3PAR ASIC chip analyzes the Fiber Channel stream and does not write zeros. Further data deduplitsiruyutsya. In the new version of the operating system 3PAR algorithm of this process has been reworked. As it turned out as a result of practical operation, some of the data is deduplicated superbly - up to 12: 1, while the rest are not deduplicating at all. To optimize the operation of the array, part of the code was rewritten, and, according to the developers, we can expect significant performance improvements. After deduplication has detected and processed repeating blocks of 16KB in size, the array tries to determine if the data inside these unique blocks can be compressed. For example, it is pointless to spend processor time on video file compression, and 3PAR will not try to do it. If data is compressed, useful information may take up a volume of 0 to 16 KB. It is important to properly pack it before writing to the SSD in such a way as not to lose the effectiveness of compression and to avoid a situation familiar to users of Windows 10, when the computer is so passionate about background processes that it cannot do anything useful. Competitive arrays require periodic garbage collection, since overwriting may change the data compression ratio, logical volumes may be deleted — and, in addition, free space cannot be used. The developers of HPE 3PAR Data Packing claim that their algorithm is efficient and does not overload the processor.
All 3PAR arrays are now shipped with a complete set of data management software within one system: HPE 3PAR Operating System Software, Virtual Copy, Dynamic Optimization, Adaptive Optimization, Priority Optimization, Virtual Domains, Virtual Lock, File Persona, Smart SAN, Online Import, Host Explorer, System Reporter, Recovery Manager Central. In that case, when you need to organize the interaction of two or more arrays, you need HPE 3PAR All Inclusive Multi-System Software, including HPE 3PAR Peer Motion, HPE 3PAR Remote Copy, HPE 3PAR Peer Persistence and HPE 3PAR Cluster Extension. Do you remember that most all-flash arrays offered by competitors have an ambiguous replication situation? 3PAR arrays do not require virtualizers to communicate with each other, but a federated storage or building fault-tolerant solutions requires a license (to try, you just need to get a temporary one - please contact).
The new licensing scheme simplifies planning when purchasing and deploying storage, as well as encourages users to move away from the traditional model of using the first-generation flash arrays "one application - one storage". 3PAR is very efficient when consolidating data, and given the HPE 3PAR Adaptive Data Reduction's stated efficiency of 4: 1, you can get a significant gain in storage costs.
This is the most important news, which was announced on February 13. If you are interested
Any of the technologies mentioned, you can find a wealth of resources on the Kelvin Zito blog (in English) or contact your HPE sales representative in Russia. We will be happy to answer your comments.
Families 3PAR 7000 four years ago. This is a very loud statement. During this time, much has changed in the industry, flash drives have overtaken hard drives in terms of sales, and some storage companies have lost their independence or even collapsed .
Interestingly, on February 13, only programmatic improvements were announced. The only hardware novelty is the four-port adapters for the 3PAR 8000 family. This is an important thing for those who use File Persona or iSCSI, but does not deserve the title of “the most important announcement”. So what's the deal?
Back in August 2016 and look at the Gartner magic quadrant in all-flash arrays. Despite the fact that HPE was among the leaders with the 3PAR line, many noticed that the company's position was far from the first place (although, judging by sales, HPE 3PAR is the No. 1 array in this segment). At the same time, Gartner analysts noted the strengths of the array - performance, scalability, a set of tools for managing data, and intelligent work with NAND memory. The report even appreciated the fact that HPE 3PAR is the only platform that is present both in the quadrant for all-flash systems and in the quadrant of traditional arrays ( "familiarity and channel partners" ). Analysts thought it was insufficient to put the company in a higher position. Here are the Cautions list:
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- Lack of compression
- Complex licensing scheme
- Insufficient analytical capabilities of managing software in comparison with competitors.
As far as these points are critical, one can argue. The implementation of compression in some solutions on the market does not allow convincingly to prove the great benefit of this technology (see the results of last year’s competition , where 3PAR without compression showed the best storage cost in competition with IBM and EMC solutions). The licensing scheme is the concern of presale at the procurement stage, which does not affect the efficiency of the array. As for analytic capabilities, do they have to be in the cloud? To do this, the system must send statistics to the cloud. To many Russian customers, this seems like a bad idea. In addition, it is possible that analysts did not take into account the presence of such an analytical tool as the HPE StoreFront Remote , which we will discuss later .
However, all these "problems" are fixed in the announcement of February 13.
HPE 3PAR Adaptive Data Reduction
New term in the HPE 3PAR dictionary. This is not just compression, it is a set of measures for the efficient storage of data. It all starts with Zero Detect, when the 3PAR ASIC chip analyzes the Fiber Channel stream and does not write zeros. Further data deduplitsiruyutsya. In the new version of the operating system 3PAR algorithm of this process has been reworked. As it turned out as a result of practical operation, some of the data is deduplicated superbly - up to 12: 1, while the rest are not deduplicating at all. To optimize the operation of the array, part of the code was rewritten, and, according to the developers, we can expect significant performance improvements. After deduplication has detected and processed repeating blocks of 16KB in size, the array tries to determine if the data inside these unique blocks can be compressed. For example, it is pointless to spend processor time on video file compression, and 3PAR will not try to do it. If data is compressed, useful information may take up a volume of 0 to 16 KB. It is important to properly pack it before writing to the SSD in such a way as not to lose the effectiveness of compression and to avoid a situation familiar to users of Windows 10, when the computer is so passionate about background processes that it cannot do anything useful. Competitive arrays require periodic garbage collection, since overwriting may change the data compression ratio, logical volumes may be deleted — and, in addition, free space cannot be used. The developers of HPE 3PAR Data Packing claim that their algorithm is efficient and does not overload the processor.
3PAR All Inclusive Licenses
All 3PAR arrays are now shipped with a complete set of data management software within one system: HPE 3PAR Operating System Software, Virtual Copy, Dynamic Optimization, Adaptive Optimization, Priority Optimization, Virtual Domains, Virtual Lock, File Persona, Smart SAN, Online Import, Host Explorer, System Reporter, Recovery Manager Central. In that case, when you need to organize the interaction of two or more arrays, you need HPE 3PAR All Inclusive Multi-System Software, including HPE 3PAR Peer Motion, HPE 3PAR Remote Copy, HPE 3PAR Peer Persistence and HPE 3PAR Cluster Extension. Do you remember that most all-flash arrays offered by competitors have an ambiguous replication situation? 3PAR arrays do not require virtualizers to communicate with each other, but a federated storage or building fault-tolerant solutions requires a license (to try, you just need to get a temporary one - please contact).
The new licensing scheme simplifies planning when purchasing and deploying storage, as well as encourages users to move away from the traditional model of using the first-generation flash arrays "one application - one storage". 3PAR is very efficient when consolidating data, and given the HPE 3PAR Adaptive Data Reduction's stated efficiency of 4: 1, you can get a significant gain in storage costs.
About other ads:
- Seven-year warranty on the wear and tear of flash memory in SSD 3PAR. As you know, HPE offers an unconditional five-year warranty on all SSDs installed in 3PAR. This warranty includes NAND wear. The fact is that Adaptive Sparing mechanisms and low-level disk space virtualization minimize wear on flash drives in 3PAR. This makes it possible not only to use the most voluminous SSD currently available for the most intensive workloads (reducing storage costs), but also to consider the “natural” failure of SSD as a warranty case. The extension of the warranty up to seven years applies to previously sold 3PAR 8000 and 20,000 arrays, starting in 2015. If there is a valid support contract, the new conditions are automatically applied to the existing storage systems.
- 3D Cache. In the context of the upcoming IT revolution related to the use of Storage Class Memory and NVMe, it is important to emphasize that the HPE 3PAR architecture is better than others to use new types of memory and supports new technologies in the current generation, which we have already mentioned .
- 3DC Peer Persistence. Support for a variety of replication scenarios, including fault-tolerant solutions from three data centers, has been typical of HPE XP arrays for many years. Now analog is available on the basis of 3PAR. Peer Persistence technology allows you to build a cluster for VMware vSphere, Microsoft Hyper-V, SQL, Oracle at different sites. In the event of a failure, the switch is fully automatic and transparent to applications. The developers of 3PAR have added support for a third data center, which can be located at a geographically remote point to ensure the highest level of fault tolerance. Imagine how much an EMC-based solution would cost. In addition to XtremIO, you would need a Recovery Point, VPLEX, and additional InfiniBand switches. In the case of 3PAR, this is only the HPE 3PAR All Inclusive Multi-System Software license.
- HPE Peer Copy . We mentioned this technology earlier when we talked about federated storage based on 3PAR, when 4 arrays are combined into a single storage pool and you can move volumes without stopping business applications as needed, balancing the load or effectively using free space. Now it is possible to do approximately the same thing between software-defined HPE StoreVirtual and 3PAR. This still requires RMC version 4.0 (this is part of the basic 3PAR software package, which is responsible for the ability to directly back up to the HPE StoreOnce virtual libraries), but we hope that replication will appear in the near future. A possible usage scenario is that HPE StoreVirtual or hyperconvergent systems in remote branches replicate data to the HPE 3PAR at the central office, without additional equipment. The RMC license is included in the HPE 3PAR All Inclusive Single System base package.
This is the most important news, which was announced on February 13. If you are interested
Any of the technologies mentioned, you can find a wealth of resources on the Kelvin Zito blog (in English) or contact your HPE sales representative in Russia. We will be happy to answer your comments.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/323398/
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