Small Product Changes Foretell Forthcoming Wave of Storage Innovation
Anyone who has followed my blogs knows that solid state drives (SSDs) have been at the top of my mind ever since this fall's SNW. However conversations that I have had with storage providers since SNW regarding the current and planned deployments of SSDs reinforce that a major shift in how storage systems are architected is coming. Already these changes are starting to show up in a number of small ways in current products that foretell a coming wave of innovation in storage technologies.
Two post-SNW briefings that I had with FalconStor Software and Quantum cemented in my mind how SSD is becoming more of a factor in the architecture of existing storage systems.
In the case of FalconStor, I was discussing some of the features found in the FalconStor Network Storage Server (NSS) with Fadi Albatal, FalconStor's senior director of product marketing. I was already aware that the NSS could virtualize any storage including SSD but he brought to my attention that NSS includes a feature known as HotZone.
This feature was first announced back in 2002 when NSS was still known as IPStor. Even back then, the HotZone option was (and still is) intended to identify frequently accessed "zones" of disk that have been previously virtualized by the FalconStor NSS appliance.
The problem this HotZone feature solves is that rather than requiring the application to always go to the virtualized backend disk subsystem when doing large amounts of high performance reads, the NSS transparently substitutes these virtualized disks with high performance disks such as SSD using HotZone. To accomplish this, the NSS copies the frequently accessed data from the disk on the virtualized storage system to the SSD that is internal to the NSS.
It is important to note the HotZone SSD disks are only intended for reads, not writes. Since the primary intent of the HotZone is to expedite tasks such as high performance database reads and since the SSD disks reside within the NSS appliance, only data that does not change is moved to the HotZone. This improves application performance without compromising the integrity of the data should a write occur.
What makes this HotZone feature significant is that FalconStor is again talking about this feature even though it announced it and has offered it as an option since 2002. The reason (as least as near as I can determine) is that SSD is obviously resonating with FalconStor's customer base.
Quantum also made a little noise around SSD with its latest DXi6500 Series release. While SSD was mentioned in passing in its press release that went out last week, you had to carefully read the entire press release to find SSD mentioned. In talking to Quantum's Product Marketing Manager, Steve Whitner, about this, he explained that at this stage SSD is primarily being deployed to improve the performance of some internal system functions within the DXi6500.
In that sense, Quantum seems to have succeeded. Quantum shared some results with me that showed the DXi6500 could achieve ingest speeds of 2 TB/hour using either its NAS interface or in conjunction with Symantec's NetBackup OpenStorage API (OST).
However users should not expect any disk-based backup appliance to include substantial amounts of SSD in their units from Quantum or anyone anytime soon. In Quantum's case, it is attempting to keep the price of its DXi6500 affordable for midsize organizations and to use SSD throughout this system (or any other) would push the price point well beyond almost any organization is currently willing to pay.
That said, FalconStor's re-emphasis on previous announced features that capitalize on SSD as well as companies like Quantum starting to use SSD on a small scale in their current systems are just the tip of the ice berg in terms of the major ways in which SSD will impact the storage market in the very near future. While there are still some minor technical issues to be worked out with SSD in terms of cost, firmware and reliability, SSD has clearly progressed to the point where it is rapidly moving off of the drawing board and into production systems. This should contribute to a lot of innovation in the storage space in the next two to three years and some exciting and much needed improvements in storage performance for users.
Two post-SNW briefings that I had with FalconStor Software and Quantum cemented in my mind how SSD is becoming more of a factor in the architecture of existing storage systems.
In the case of FalconStor, I was discussing some of the features found in the FalconStor Network Storage Server (NSS) with Fadi Albatal, FalconStor's senior director of product marketing. I was already aware that the NSS could virtualize any storage including SSD but he brought to my attention that NSS includes a feature known as HotZone.
This feature was first announced back in 2002 when NSS was still known as IPStor. Even back then, the HotZone option was (and still is) intended to identify frequently accessed "zones" of disk that have been previously virtualized by the FalconStor NSS appliance.
The problem this HotZone feature solves is that rather than requiring the application to always go to the virtualized backend disk subsystem when doing large amounts of high performance reads, the NSS transparently substitutes these virtualized disks with high performance disks such as SSD using HotZone. To accomplish this, the NSS copies the frequently accessed data from the disk on the virtualized storage system to the SSD that is internal to the NSS.
It is important to note the HotZone SSD disks are only intended for reads, not writes. Since the primary intent of the HotZone is to expedite tasks such as high performance database reads and since the SSD disks reside within the NSS appliance, only data that does not change is moved to the HotZone. This improves application performance without compromising the integrity of the data should a write occur.
What makes this HotZone feature significant is that FalconStor is again talking about this feature even though it announced it and has offered it as an option since 2002. The reason (as least as near as I can determine) is that SSD is obviously resonating with FalconStor's customer base.
Quantum also made a little noise around SSD with its latest DXi6500 Series release. While SSD was mentioned in passing in its press release that went out last week, you had to carefully read the entire press release to find SSD mentioned. In talking to Quantum's Product Marketing Manager, Steve Whitner, about this, he explained that at this stage SSD is primarily being deployed to improve the performance of some internal system functions within the DXi6500.
In that sense, Quantum seems to have succeeded. Quantum shared some results with me that showed the DXi6500 could achieve ingest speeds of 2 TB/hour using either its NAS interface or in conjunction with Symantec's NetBackup OpenStorage API (OST).
However users should not expect any disk-based backup appliance to include substantial amounts of SSD in their units from Quantum or anyone anytime soon. In Quantum's case, it is attempting to keep the price of its DXi6500 affordable for midsize organizations and to use SSD throughout this system (or any other) would push the price point well beyond almost any organization is currently willing to pay.
That said, FalconStor's re-emphasis on previous announced features that capitalize on SSD as well as companies like Quantum starting to use SSD on a small scale in their current systems are just the tip of the ice berg in terms of the major ways in which SSD will impact the storage market in the very near future. While there are still some minor technical issues to be worked out with SSD in terms of cost, firmware and reliability, SSD has clearly progressed to the point where it is rapidly moving off of the drawing board and into production systems. This should contribute to a lot of innovation in the storage space in the next two to three years and some exciting and much needed improvements in storage performance for users.
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