Archive for June, 2012
Posted June 25th, 2012
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Kaminario Will Always Be All Solid-State SAN Storage
THOUGHTS ON A POST BY RUBEN SPRUIJT
By Gareth Taube, Vice President Marketing, Kaminario
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One of the challenges of offering a unique product is that sometimes it can be difficult for outsiders to classify it with other solutions in the market. So we see, from time to time, published articles that either put the K2 in the wrong bucket or don’t describe the K2’s capabilities completely.
Such is the case with a recent blog by Ruben Spruijt that discusses different types of SSD solutions including hybrid file systems, Flash-only arrays and server-side Flash. While it is true that the Kaminario K2 offers a single enclosure for blade servers connected with Flash, it is not accurate to include the K2 in the server-side Flash category. Spruijt does not specifically call out Kaminario as a server-side SSD solution, but it appears that way from the mention.
Kaminario Makes All Solid-State SAN Storage — Absent a category for all solid-state SAN storage to include Flash and DRAM, Spruijt should have mentioned the K2 in his Flash-only array discussion. As my colleague Eyal Markovich said, “server-based PCIe cards are, by nature, local to the server, so they cannot serve as part of a server cluster. That means they’re out as an SSD solution for running Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) or an SQL Server instance as part of a Microsoft Cluster. Since the K2 is SAN-based, it fully supports these clustering configurations.” This is just one example why readers should understand that the K2 is a solid-state SAN storage array versus a server-side SSD solution.
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Tags:application performance, database, Database Performance, DataProtect, Disk latency, Flash, Flash SSD, high availability, I/O bottlenecks, IOPS, K2, Kaminario, Storage Performance, writes
Posted in SSD Storage Performance | No Comments »
Posted June 18th, 2012
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SSD Array Architectures and Latency: The Proof is in the Pudding
PROOF THAT SSD ARCHITECTURE MATTERS
By Gareth Taube, Vice President Marketing, Kaminario
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There are some interesting discussions revolving around Robin Harris’s StorageMojo blog—too bad he’s taken a vacation just when the discussion’s getting really good. The topic is SSD architectures and whether disk-form-factor SSD arrays can possibly provide the kind of performance speed-hungry applications require.
At Kaminario we’ve long argued that a disk-form-factor SSD architecture is inherently flawed. While the SSD itself might deliver on performance, inevitably the legacy storage controllers and other legacy components become a performance and reliability bottleneck, increasing latency and reducing throughput as several SSD’s vie for the same limited pipe.
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Tags:architecture, benchmarks, bottleneck, disk form factor array, Flash, Howard Marks, K2, Kaminario, latency, Robin Harris, SAS, SATA, SSD, SSD array, SSD performance, storage controller, StorageMojo
Posted in SSD Architectures | No Comments »
Posted June 11th, 2012
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StorageSearch Post Helps Readers Evaluate SSDs
KEREKES EXAMINES SYMMETTRIES IN SSD DESIGN
By Gareth Taube, Vice President Marketing, Kaminario
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Long-time StorageSearch readers like me know that Zsolt Kerekes writes a lot about SSD design. He frequently comments on what he calls symmetries. It is the notion that some SSD features/characteristics can yield excellent performance in certain scenarios but not in others. Symmetries can also be performance tradeoffs such as speed versus wear.
Kerekes argues that symmetries are a method to “comparatively describe or evaluate any type of SSD using any memory technology and any type of interface.” In an extensive piece, he describes 11 SSD symmetries including ones about read/write, applications, scalability and age. I think the article is a good resource for organizations considering SSD technology for their data center. The article raises many questions that should spur good customer/vendor discussion. Take a look.
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Tags:application performance, DRAM, Flash, K2-H, Kaminario, Kerekes, SSD, Storage Performance, StorageSearch
Posted in SSD Architectures | No Comments »
Posted June 4th, 2012
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Solid-State Storage TCO and Simplicity
GETTING MORE OUT OF YOUR SSD INVESTMENT
By Gareth Taube, Vice President Marketing, Kaminario
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Two blog posts have appeared in the past month with similar interesting themes. In the Storage Soup blog, TCO vs. ROI: Remember transition costs, Randy Kerns discusses the importance of total cost of ownership (TCO) in any storage decision and the role of transition costs, product lifespan, and operational and administrative costs in TCO calculations. Similarly, in the Wikibon blog, Simplicity and transparency are becoming standard features in storage, Scott Lowe talks about the growing importance of product simplicity in taming the storage beast. I particularly like this quote: “IT organizations need to spend less time touching the infrastructure and more time on the business.”
These are important factors to consider when deciding whether to take the SSD plunge, because many people still have the perception that SSD arrays like the Kaminario K2 are expensive. When you consider TCO and simplicity, however, they start to look more like bargains.
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Tags:cooling, data center, data migration, disk, DRAM, Flash, K2, Kaminario, LUNs, management interface, parallelization, power, RAID, Randy Kerns, ROI, scale, Scott Lowe, simplicity, snapshots, SPEAR, spindles, SSD, Storage Soup, TCO, total cost of ownership, Wikibon
Posted in SSD TCO | No Comments »
