IBM Storage

IBM Storwize® V7000 Unified stores up to five times more unstructured data in the same space with integrated Real-time Compression

http://www.ibm.com/systems/storage/news/ibm-smarter-storage-20121004.html

Today IBM announced the enhancement of compressing not only block data on the V7000 but also now it includes the file data on the V7000 Unified.  The V7000 was first set up with compression back in the summer with a big announcement surrounding “Smarter Storage”.  This optimization was the same code and engine that was purchased from a company named Storwize a few years ago.

IBM initially kept the compression appliance that Storwize was first known for in the market.  Using LZ compression with a RACE (Random Access Compression Engine) providing an optimized real-time compression without performance degradation. Thus slowing down data growth and reducing the amount of storage to be managed, powered and cooled.

The compression does not require the compression or decompression of entire files to access the data block. The engine will compress and decompress the relevant data blocks “on the fly”.  As data is written the RACE engine compresses the data into a smaller chunk and its 100% transparent for systems, storage and applications.

The V7000 Unified can now deliver a larger compressed platform than any other mid-range platform.  With compression percentages around 75%, a system that was maxed out at 2.8 PB (960 drives x 3TB each) can now see the system handle up to 5 PB of storage.

Each V7000 Unified with code base 6.4 has the option of turning on a 45 day trial of the compression software.  After setting the license to “45” then you can add new compressed volumes on the system.  You can also compress data on virtualized storage arrays. 

Compression has been part of NAS for a very long time.  We have seen compression of files from jpeg to office documents.  But the best part is the end user will never have to worry about which files needed to zipped or compressed. Everything that comes through the V700 Unified can be compressed in line before it writes the data to disks.

A couple of other improvements that IBM announced were the addition of a integrated LDAP server to V7000 Unified.  This now allows customers to use both local authentication and external authentication servers to allow access to data.  Another feature was the ability to upgrade a V7000 to a V7000 Unified in the field.  If you currently own a V7000 but need to add file access to the system, IBM will sell you the two file modules and corresponding software to upgrade you system. Now mind you there is a list of requirements that will need to be met so check with your local storage engineer for more information. And finally we now have support for a 4 way cluster on V7000 unified.  This allows for more disks to be provisioned and can compete with some of the other mid-range storage platforms in the market.

This all together makes a nice round of improvements that will make life easier for IBM customers.  As the V7000 platform matures it looks like IBM is putting their money where their mouth is and making storage smarter and more efficient.  More to come on this platform as I suspect we will see bigger things down the road.