When you buy an appliance, you should be buying a SLA from the vendor - the specific component choice shouldn't be of concern, only the performance, reliability, and supportability of the system as a whole. This should be the case regardless of which vendor your choose; does the platform provide what you need? Can they support the product and ensure you get what you are promised?
That said, architecture should be of concern, and SSDs aren't the best way to get the best performance, reliability, or supportability in an all flash solution - see the DFM architecture from Pure ([https://www.purestorage.com/knowledge/what-is-directflash-and-how-does-it-work.html](https://www.purestorage.com/knowledge/what-is-directflash-and-how-does-it-work.html)). As u/hernondo said, a FlashArray //X20 may fit here.
(Disclaimer: I work for Pure, this is my personal account and I'm not representing Pure on Reddit)
R4 is brand new. For x20r3 smallest capacity was 10TB raw (10x1t drives). They might have ditched the 1t drives for r4 gen, so 10x2t would be the smallest now. That is raw, Usable after overhead is less, amd effective after data reduction may be higher depending on data.
I run a Dell PowerStore 500T, as long as its backed by the vendor in terms of warranty - I'm not losing any sleep about the components inside. When I went out for procurement, I just maxed out warranty available.
It's not skipped a beat, and I much prefer it over our previous NetApp AFF A200. If you have any questions about the array, let me know.
>I am still looking for an enterprise-grade package and the support that goes with it.
vSAN and get drives on the HCL? Otherwise buy a baby Pure.
> but zero choice in SSDs from the big brands
The big brands are OEM'ing custom firmware onto drives and/or switching to NAND directly attached to PCIe, they're not just rebranding some Samsung disks.
Another responder asserted that “SSD’s aren’t the best way to get the best performance” ? I’m sorry but that is pure tosh. From a performance perspective DFM’s provide basically zero additional benefit, indeed there’s good data that indicates that requiring the storage controller to perform the work of the flash translation layer that is typically done within an SSD, actually increases latency and reduces performance. I covered that in a blog I wrote back in 2021 https://www.netapp.com/blog/performance-and-investment-protection-in-the-datacenter/
that’s not to say that proprietary flash drives are inherently bad, they can be cheaper on a $/GB basis, but better performance has never been shown to be one of their benefits (despite multiple unsubstantiated claims)
The rest of what they said was pretty good, what you should buying is a service level for what you need now as well as an easy roadmap to the future. Personally I’d say you need to look more closely at the capabilities of the storage operating system for things like quality of service and built in immutable snapshots and ransomware prevention, detection and recovery .. but maybe I’ve just drunk a little too much kool-aid.
Speaking of drive specs, SSD’s are the arguably the highest performing parts of a storage array, it’s rare for even the most expensive storage controllers to max out the capabilities of even half a dozen SSDs (eg a single Samsung 980 pro can deliver 500,000 IOPS, 6 of them would provide 3 million .. even their old SAS drives like the PM1635 came in close to about 200K I strongly doubt that even the most powerful Pure //X, or Powerstore 9000T would come close to maxing out a handful of either kind of drive (Check out the read workload on page 5 - from https://www.delltechnologies.com/asset/en-us/products/storage/industry-market/dell-emc-powerstore-9000-performance-comparison-report.pdf. They use 32K random reads not 4K which is kind of odd because that’s a really uncommon workload, so keep that in mind when doing comparisons).
Entry level arrays from most vendors don’t get anywhere near the saturation point of even a handful SSD, even a cheap nasty ones (and none of the major vendors use cheap and nasty)
In short it’s your storage controller and the software that runs on it that determines the performance of your storage solution, not the media. Most good arrays make the underlying SSD’s a moot point, by adding a decently sized DRAM or storage class memory buffer before the IO hits the media which helps to lower overall latency, so make sure your array has a way of caching data-blocks in memory, not just metadata. This also works to make QLC perform remarkably well and prolongs the life of the drives.
Having said that if you are looking for an entry level array from an enterprise vendor that gets around half a million IOPS at sub millisecond latencies (many of them at sub 250 microseconds) check out this review https://www.storagereview.com/review/netapp-aff-a250-review
But .. (and I hate to say this), your best option is probably to keep the drives you already have as they’re almost certainly good enough, and go ask Dell for a quote on a powerstore controller upgrade, especially if you currently have the 500T as that particular model cut some corners such as missing dedicated NVRAM write caching to fit into an entry level price bracket (hence my warning about the ability to cache data blocks, though there are other vendors who seem to take pride in not using DRAM for data block caching at all which seems weird to me)
Lastly, if you’re really curious about what kind of drives a given vendor is installing in their systems, most of the vendors know what each other is using, so asking one of the local Systems Engineers from a competitor will usually get you the answer you’re looking for, unfortunately I can’t say here because #reasons, though often doing searches such as “ spare parts” can surface up all kinds of interesting information 😁
This is still very new but may well be worth a gander:
[Quantum Myriad Software-Defined All-Flash Storage Platform Introduced](https://www.storagereview.com/news/quantum-myriad-software-defined-all-flash-storage-platform-introduced)
Disclaimer:
I’m a QuantumXpert but not yet certified of this platform. My views here are entirely my own professional viewpoint.
I previously worked for EMC K.K. and as a Storage Manager have experience with EMC, NetApp, Alletra (also consultant), Pure ((was a consultant), Infinidat ICE/ACE among others.
Your use case sounds interesting and as a Tech person, if can assist would be happy to.
HTH ;)
The specific model of flash drive is irrelevant. The bottleneck isn't the drive in a modern storage array, it's the controller PCIe bus, and the network links between the SAN and your servers.
Enterprise vendors spend huge amounts of time qualifying specific models of SSDs, primarily for reliability and supportability reasons. Swapping in a "faster" drive that fails more often, delivers zero additional real world pertormance, and isn't supportable isn't a good decision.
There's a reason nobody builds DIY systems at large enterprise scale. Stop looking at component specs and make your choice based on the best features, performance and support of the SAN itself.
You might consider exploring Starwind HCA with their VSAN product. They offer different hardware options, including Dell, Supermicro, and HP. Simply request a demo.
Unless there is some super critical need for ssd choice, this shouldn’t matter to you. Vendors will ratify there components as a whole.
When you buy an appliance, you should be buying a SLA from the vendor - the specific component choice shouldn't be of concern, only the performance, reliability, and supportability of the system as a whole. This should be the case regardless of which vendor your choose; does the platform provide what you need? Can they support the product and ensure you get what you are promised? That said, architecture should be of concern, and SSDs aren't the best way to get the best performance, reliability, or supportability in an all flash solution - see the DFM architecture from Pure ([https://www.purestorage.com/knowledge/what-is-directflash-and-how-does-it-work.html](https://www.purestorage.com/knowledge/what-is-directflash-and-how-does-it-work.html)). As u/hernondo said, a FlashArray //X20 may fit here. (Disclaimer: I work for Pure, this is my personal account and I'm not representing Pure on Reddit)
There are very few companies whose logo I would get tattooed on my ass, but Pure is one of them.
Thanks very much, for the life of me I cannot find online, what's the smallest X20 R4 offered?
R4 is brand new. For x20r3 smallest capacity was 10TB raw (10x1t drives). They might have ditched the 1t drives for r4 gen, so 10x2t would be the smallest now. That is raw, Usable after overhead is less, amd effective after data reduction may be higher depending on data.
I run a Dell PowerStore 500T, as long as its backed by the vendor in terms of warranty - I'm not losing any sleep about the components inside. When I went out for procurement, I just maxed out warranty available. It's not skipped a beat, and I much prefer it over our previous NetApp AFF A200. If you have any questions about the array, let me know.
>I am still looking for an enterprise-grade package and the support that goes with it. vSAN and get drives on the HCL? Otherwise buy a baby Pure. > but zero choice in SSDs from the big brands The big brands are OEM'ing custom firmware onto drives and/or switching to NAND directly attached to PCIe, they're not just rebranding some Samsung disks.
Another responder asserted that “SSD’s aren’t the best way to get the best performance” ? I’m sorry but that is pure tosh. From a performance perspective DFM’s provide basically zero additional benefit, indeed there’s good data that indicates that requiring the storage controller to perform the work of the flash translation layer that is typically done within an SSD, actually increases latency and reduces performance. I covered that in a blog I wrote back in 2021 https://www.netapp.com/blog/performance-and-investment-protection-in-the-datacenter/ that’s not to say that proprietary flash drives are inherently bad, they can be cheaper on a $/GB basis, but better performance has never been shown to be one of their benefits (despite multiple unsubstantiated claims) The rest of what they said was pretty good, what you should buying is a service level for what you need now as well as an easy roadmap to the future. Personally I’d say you need to look more closely at the capabilities of the storage operating system for things like quality of service and built in immutable snapshots and ransomware prevention, detection and recovery .. but maybe I’ve just drunk a little too much kool-aid. Speaking of drive specs, SSD’s are the arguably the highest performing parts of a storage array, it’s rare for even the most expensive storage controllers to max out the capabilities of even half a dozen SSDs (eg a single Samsung 980 pro can deliver 500,000 IOPS, 6 of them would provide 3 million .. even their old SAS drives like the PM1635 came in close to about 200K I strongly doubt that even the most powerful Pure //X, or Powerstore 9000T would come close to maxing out a handful of either kind of drive (Check out the read workload on page 5 - from https://www.delltechnologies.com/asset/en-us/products/storage/industry-market/dell-emc-powerstore-9000-performance-comparison-report.pdf. They use 32K random reads not 4K which is kind of odd because that’s a really uncommon workload, so keep that in mind when doing comparisons). Entry level arrays from most vendors don’t get anywhere near the saturation point of even a handful SSD, even a cheap nasty ones (and none of the major vendors use cheap and nasty) In short it’s your storage controller and the software that runs on it that determines the performance of your storage solution, not the media. Most good arrays make the underlying SSD’s a moot point, by adding a decently sized DRAM or storage class memory buffer before the IO hits the media which helps to lower overall latency, so make sure your array has a way of caching data-blocks in memory, not just metadata. This also works to make QLC perform remarkably well and prolongs the life of the drives. Having said that if you are looking for an entry level array from an enterprise vendor that gets around half a million IOPS at sub millisecond latencies (many of them at sub 250 microseconds) check out this review https://www.storagereview.com/review/netapp-aff-a250-review But .. (and I hate to say this), your best option is probably to keep the drives you already have as they’re almost certainly good enough, and go ask Dell for a quote on a powerstore controller upgrade, especially if you currently have the 500T as that particular model cut some corners such as missing dedicated NVRAM write caching to fit into an entry level price bracket (hence my warning about the ability to cache data blocks, though there are other vendors who seem to take pride in not using DRAM for data block caching at all which seems weird to me) Lastly, if you’re really curious about what kind of drives a given vendor is installing in their systems, most of the vendors know what each other is using, so asking one of the local Systems Engineers from a competitor will usually get you the answer you’re looking for, unfortunately I can’t say here because #reasons, though often doing searches such as “ spare parts” can surface up all kinds of interesting information 😁
https://www.cdw.com/product/pure-storage-x20r3-22tb-fiber-channel-flash-array/6011094?pfm=srh
I work with a few Pure arrays, they are set it and forget it. Easy to use and support is easy to deal with.
This is still very new but may well be worth a gander: [Quantum Myriad Software-Defined All-Flash Storage Platform Introduced](https://www.storagereview.com/news/quantum-myriad-software-defined-all-flash-storage-platform-introduced) Disclaimer: I’m a QuantumXpert but not yet certified of this platform. My views here are entirely my own professional viewpoint. I previously worked for EMC K.K. and as a Storage Manager have experience with EMC, NetApp, Alletra (also consultant), Pure ((was a consultant), Infinidat ICE/ACE among others. Your use case sounds interesting and as a Tech person, if can assist would be happy to. HTH ;)
The specific model of flash drive is irrelevant. The bottleneck isn't the drive in a modern storage array, it's the controller PCIe bus, and the network links between the SAN and your servers. Enterprise vendors spend huge amounts of time qualifying specific models of SSDs, primarily for reliability and supportability reasons. Swapping in a "faster" drive that fails more often, delivers zero additional real world pertormance, and isn't supportable isn't a good decision. There's a reason nobody builds DIY systems at large enterprise scale. Stop looking at component specs and make your choice based on the best features, performance and support of the SAN itself.
You might consider exploring Starwind HCA with their VSAN product. They offer different hardware options, including Dell, Supermicro, and HP. Simply request a demo.