VMware's Virtual SAN Threatens Traditional Data Storage Models VMware has launched the final part of its software defined data center puzzle: a virtual SAN product called Virtual SAN. The product has been in beta testing for the last six months, with around 12,000 customers, but there were still plenty of surprise announcements made at the launch event on March 6. The biggest of these was the maximum size of its Virtual SAN. Previously VMware had said that this would be 8 server nodes, and then 16. Now for some math. "This is a monster," said Gelsinger, echoing the monster VM concept that the company introduced in 2011 with the introduction of vSphere 5. He added that performance scales linearly - a 16 node setup offers 1M IOPS, a 32 node one offers 2M IOPS - and despite his previous comment about 32 nodes being monstrous, he hinted that even larger Virtual SANs are on the roadmap: "There will be more in the future. So how does Virtual SAN work and what makes it different from other virtual storage products from the likes of Nutanix or Nexenta?
www.vmware.com/files/pdf/products/vsphere/VMware-vSphere-Storage-Appliance-Datasheet.pdf VMware storage: SAN configuration basics VMware storage entails more than simply mapping a logical unit number (LUN) to a physical server. VMware’s vSphere enables system administrators to create multiple virtual servers on a single physical server chassis. The underlying hypervisor, vSphere ESXi, can use both internal and external storage devices for guest virtual machines. In this article we will discuss the basics of using storage area network (SAN) storage on vSphere and the factors administrators should consider when planning a shared SAN storage deployment. VMware storage: SAN basics vSphere supports internally-connected disks that include JBODs, hardware RAID arrays, solid-state disks and PCIe SSD cards. SAN storage, however, provides a shared, highly available and resilient storage platform that can scale to a multi-server deployment. It is possible to use NAS and SAN-based storage products with vSphere, but in this article we will consider only SAN, or block-based devices. VMware file system and datastores
VMware launches efficient virtual storage solution VMware has launched Virtual SAN, an application-centric storage solution for virtualised networks. The new solution, built into VMware's vSphere kernel, provides hypervisor-converged storage, pooling internal magnetic disks and flash devices from x86 servers to produce a shared datastore for virtual machines. Virtual SAN can perform 2 million input/output operations per second (IOPS) on a read-only workload on a 32-node cluster, and 640,000 IOPS on a mixed workload on a 32-node cluster. The hypervisor-converged architecture lets Virtual SAN deliver the most efficient data path, which means its CPU resource consumption is less than 10 per cent. Scalability and integration Additional features include elastic and linear scalability, flash performance acceleration through read/write caching, and storage policy based management. VMware promises high reliability, with protection against data loss in the event of a hardware failure. Via TechWorld Is virtualisation an IT infrastructure for dinosaurs?
Storage Resource Management Time and time again, I hear customers ask for a tool that provides a view into storage relationships in order to analyze configurations and capacity growth. They want insight into the bottlenecks that can lie in many possible places between the spindle and the application. But the question we need to ask ourselves is this: does end-to-end monitoring and analysis of storage through historical or real-time metrics for applications, hosts, switches, and arrays constitute “storage resource management”? Storage “Best Practices” For a moment, let’s consider a couple of fundamental characteristics for storage, capacity and performance. There’s a Disconnect Everything always links back to the applications regardless of the preparation and insight we have, and we are always striving to meet some sort of SLA. Monitoring for the sake of being alerted to problems doesn’t actually solve anything regardless of where we are in the IT stack.
Virtual Storage Console (VSC) - VMware vSphere Storage | NetApp NetApp® Virtual Storage Console for VMware® vSphere™ provides integrated, comprehensive, end-to-end virtual storage management for your VMware infrastructure, including discovery, health monitoring, capacity management, provisioning, cloning, backup, restore, and disaster recovery. It integrates manageability for NetApp Flash Accel™ host-based caching solutions. Virtual Storage Console lets your VMware administrators access and execute all these capabilities from VMware vCenter™. Using its built-in role-based access control (RBAC), you can control who does what, enhancing server and storage efficiencies without affecting your storage administrators’ policies. Without the right tools for effective data storage management, your VM administrators have little visibility into the storage underlying your virtual infrastructure, making it challenging to optimize IT efficiency and respond to fast-changing business requirements.
vSphere Storage Appliance (VSA) for Shared Storage End of Availability VMware is announcing the End of Availability of all vSphere Storage Appliance versions, effective April 1, 2014. After this date you will no longer be able to purchase this product. All support and maintenance for vSphere Storage Appliance 5.5 will be unaffected and will continue to follow the Enterprise Infrastructure Support Policy. The End of General Support life date for customers with vSphere Storage Appliance 5.5 remains September 19, 2018. Customers interested in moving to a new VMware software-defined storage solution may elect to upgrade to VMware Virtual SAN. Everything VMware At EMC: Virtual Storage Integrator 5.6 - What's New The Virtual Storage Integrator or VSI has been around for a while. Seems every release something new and exciting gets added that customer have asked for. The VSI 5.6 plugin for EMC is the latest version (9/16/2013) of the plugin to help streamline and simplify interactions between the vSphere client and the EMC storage used to support your Virtual Data Center/Private Cloud/Software Defined Data Center. The VSI plugin can be downloaded for no extra charge if you have a current support.emc.com account (BTW so glad it is not powerlink anymore). You may just want to post a question on the EMC Community about the VSI. Enough background already what is new in the new version 5.6? XtremIO Support Awesome provisioning and visibility for the new all flash array from EMC. VPLEX Support Our data mobility team is super excited about now supporting VPLEX provisioning in the VSI plugin. New Demo of the VSI Provisioning VPLEX: VMAX Provisioning with Striped Meta Demo of VMAX Provisioning
What is virtual storage? - Definition from WhatIs.com Virtual storage is the pooling of physical storage from multiple network storage devices into what appears to be a single storage device that is managed from a central console. By submitting your email address, you agree to receive emails regarding relevant topic offers from TechTarget and its partners. You can withdraw your consent at any time. Contact TechTarget at 275 Grove Street, Newton, MA. You also agree that your personal information may be transferred and processed in the United States, and that you have read and agree to the Terms of Use and the Privacy Policy. Storage virtualization software converts a server, typically an X86 server, into a storage controller and the storage inside the server into the storage system. Enterprise virtual storage products include Hitachi Data Systems’ Virtual Storage Platform (VSP), IBM SAN Volume Controller (SVC) and NetApp V-Series. See also: storage virtualization, software-defined storage, storage hypervisor
NetApp Introduces Software-Defined Storage for VMware Virtual Volumes | Cloud Storage content from Talkin' Cloud NetApp (NTAP) has announced new solutions for VMware's Virtual Volumes (VVols), OnCommand software with enhanced data protection and reporting capabilities and flash-optimized FlexPod with VMware Horizon View. Network data storage and management solutions provider NetApp (NTAP) has unveiled solutions for VMware's (VMW's) Virtual Volumes (VVols) storage systems. Suzette Pereira-Beardsley, solutions marketing manager for VMware Solutions, told Talkin' Cloud she believes VVols will transform virtual machine-level (VM-level) management of storage resources and data services. "VVols are setting the stage to fundamentally change how storage arrays manage VMware VMs," she said. "VVols provide granular VM management, allowing VMs to be individually configured ... Now, key storage services such as snapshots, quality of service and disaster recovery can all be defined and applied by the storage array." How does the NetApp-VMware partnership impact customers?