NetAppChat

Evolving SAN Environments
How does improved performance & availability in your SAN environment improve business value?
   10 years ago
#NetAppChatFind Your WinIT is in a state of transition – how do you win during these challenges and navigate these changes?
Rip Wilson
Q6: Another on flash. Today's enterprises need to provide real-time data access and apps need to overcome storage bottlenecks. How is Flash helping to achieve this?
Nick Howell
The race to 0us is on. It's all about that latency. Period.
Dan C. Barber
A6: @datacenterdude agreed. But my question is how many people and apps really need near-zero latency?
Adam J. Bergh
@dancbarber Is flash fundamentally changing how apps are designed?
Gilda Foss
A6 : Flash is being leveraged for high-performance applications that speed response time. This is a great example of a practical application of flash. #boom
Mark Welke
Storage bottlenecks have a high cost associated with them. Eliminating the bottle neck means more efficient servers, which equates to less of them. More importantly less software licenses, this is where the real saving take place.
Nick Howell
You wouldn't be surprised. Some of the biggest names that host data for the consumer digital products you use every day run on EF550/560, and that was a core requirement of all of them.
Dan C. Barber
@ajbergh Flash is showing app developers the potential they have. Case in point: what if a major retailer could get realtime info on every purchase a customer made right at the Point-of-Sale device?
Rip Wilson
A6: As this customer says: flash is helping his team consider workloads not possible before. http://www.netapp.co...
Dan C. Barber
@ajbergh Now me, the retailer, can offer relevant services instead of "would you like to sign up for a rewards card? Oh wait, you already have one :)
Data Definer
A6: Server-side flash avoids bottlenecks for deduplication.
Gilda Foss
A6 : Gee, I know of a SAN that backs up enterprise applications in seconds and restore them in minutes... #NTAP
Gilda Foss
@DataDefiner Flash, especially the way NetApp has designed their FlashRay, uses global inline deduplication, byte-granular inline compression, variable length block layout and adaptable performance.
Dan C. Barber
@DataDefiner do you see a multi-level caching strategy? VM-HBA-Host-Switch-Controller-Disk?
Data Definer
@GildaFoss A6: Hey @GildaFoss That sounds like a data platform I know, too! #CV
Nick Howell
Mark nailed it. The biggest cost-savings is in less hw required, which equates to less licenses and support contracts needed. Doing more with less always saves. Been NetApp's M.O. for a long time. "Go Further, Faster"
Data Definer
@dancbarber A6: More than just IOPS!
Data Definer
@dancbarber Absolutely! All the time with CommVault.
Rip Wilson
My favorite is hearing about customers who go from overnight queries to over-lunch queries with #netappflash
Data Definer
@GildaFoss Flash also works great with source-side dedupe, inline compression, etc. I recommend server-side flash and/or AFAs all the time!
Rip Wilson
Q8: With storage needs growing exponentially, how do enterprises who are looking at all flash solutions integrate with larger capacity needs?
Nick Howell
Anyone that thinks the whole datacenter will be all-flash all-the-time for all-the-things is silly in the head. There will always be a need for "cheap & deep" for WORM, archival, cold storage, and off-site long-term retention.
Nick Howell
(cont) and that will still constitute a MAJORITY of total data in any enterprise.
Gilda Foss
A8 : The most successful enterprise storage strategy will continue to be one that uses both flash & hard disk. Over the next 5 yrs, hard disks won't begin to approach flash perf, & flash won't begin to approach the capacity needed. #justfacts
Dan C. Barber
@datacenterdude agreed. there will always bee the cheap & deep
Ed Morgan ☁️🦄
Drop an All Flash FAS in a cDOT cluster...
Data Definer
A8: One word: Data mgmt. Archiving. Not everything needs to be on tier-0/1!
Gilda Foss
A8 : Bottom line is that the all-flash array that have no integration with existing hybrid flash/disk arrays, will be the hot rod in the garage of IT. Fun to tinker with, but not the reliable storage workhorse IT needs. #period
Mark Welke
Flash as a caching tier with low cost SATA, near-line SAS for capacity, all flash array on pre with capacity in the cloud
Data Definer
A8: And don't forget @AWS and @Azure -- data must be searchable, recoverable, etc.
Rip Wilson
A8: Performance disk is in trouble, but capacity disk will have a big $/GB advantage over even the cheapest for of flash for a while. Hybrid architectures (flash+disk), whether on-prem or leveraging the cloud, are the new normal.
Adam J. Bergh
A8: Hybrid approaches - Flash as a tier or a cache to traditional media will be the new "normal" in the near term
Gilda Foss
A8 : Enterprise storage continues to move rapidly to a hybrid model, where models are applied both within & beyond the enterprise's traditional boundary between hardware it owns & manages.
Nick Howell
@DataDefiner Good point, Brian. I still hold firm that DRaaS will become one of the first major uses of public cloud from the enterprise. From a simple capacity play. Hell, I do it at home!
Dan C. Barber
@GildaFoss Everything is moving toward hybrid. There isn't a one-size-fits-all SAN, nor is there cloud, compute, network, application.
Gilda Foss
Driving the point home : The Future of All-Flash Arrays is Not All Flash.
Dan C. Barber
@GildaFoss or at least not everything on an AFA
Dan C. Barber
Maybe as @mo6020 said an #AFF within a larger #cDOT cluster
Data Definer
@datacenterdude Yep, and long-term cold storage.
Ravi Mahendrakar
All flash for storage simply doesn't scale... data has tiers and so will storage. With Software Defined Storage #SDS, customers can look creating storage management policies and automating data movement in line with "data tiers"...
Rip Wilson
Q4: What are the top three challenges you’re experiencing in optimizing your SAN environments?
Dan C. Barber
A4: Faster data access is key; #flash is certainly helping that.
Nick Howell
The top three things I hear: a) Ease of setup/maintenance b) connecting to host environments (i.e. proper zoning/config) and c) Staff doesn't scale as well.
Dan C. Barber
@datacenterdude Agree on the staff part. When personnel is one of the biggests costs, a scalable SAN is very important to business effectiveness.
Ariana Gradow
.@ripw5280 I'm not SAN expert but I assume that it is important to pay attention to the fundamentals of SQL Server
Nick Howell
(cont) These are not new problems. As much as we want to believe Flash will be the end-all, be-all for SAN, the reality is many of the core problems still exist. SAN is still SAN.
Dave Vellante
Complexity of data migrations
Dan C. Barber
@arianagradow it is certainly fundamental to understand your workloads. Too many people just say "put it on flash and don't worry about it."
Dave Vellante
@datacenterdude I agree. Flash deals with mechanical latency and it can help with copy creep but you still need a management stack
R Cox
meeting backup windows and backup for remote sites
Data Definer
A4: Challenges are lack of granular data recovery; no easy way to manage compliance; data migration too costly.
Jesse Anderson
A4: 1. Ease of use. 2. Updated infrastructure to use advanced features. 3. Training people to use and understand the new technologies.
Gilda Foss
A4 : Top 3? Biz-critical DB’s & apps running by virtually eliminating storage downtime, improving ops perf (make better-informed decisions), increase the efficiency of DB’s+ apps & reducing IT mgmt workloads, & high perf with high productivity
Dan C. Barber
R Cox, how much does bandwidth play into this?
Dan C. Barber
@dvellante @datacenterdude Not mention personnel and operational latency—I think we could solve a lot of problems that way!
Ravi Mahendrakar
@dvellante Could you please expand on data migrations? Have you looked as thin provisioning and reclamation? #NetAppChat
R Cox
bandwidth and dedup are important