Storage specialist NetApp introduced two hardware platforms, the EF550 all-flash array and the E2700 for small remote or branch offices, and updated a third, the E5500, with enhanced performance, density and modular flexibility.
The EF550’s scale-up architecture is designed to provide more data access to low-latency performance while remote replication helps enable business-critical applications to be better protected at a remote site. Key applications include database, virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) and Web services.
The E-Series, part of NetApp’s portfolio of block-based, performance-optimized storage appliances, offers Dynamic Disk Pools, Intelligent Cache Tiering with solid state drive (SSD) cache, the company’s AutoSupport tool and remote replication in a simple array.
With the E2700, NetApp, by introducing 12G SAS technology, greatly accelerated the appliance’s application performance and allowed IT departments to add storage capacity as their organizations grow without reconfiguring running applications. The appliance also includes support of fabric controller (FC), Internet small computer system interface (iSCSI) and SAS.
“Our product innovation strategy is to deliver the industry’s leading portfolio of cloud-integrated and flash-accelerated storage and data management solutions. These solutions satisfy our customers’ needs for their multiple workloads and deployment models—either dedicated or as part of a shared infrastructure,” George Kurian, executive vice president of product operations for NetApp, said in a statement. By expanding our EF-Series all-flash arrays and E-Series platforms, we are meeting growing market demand for dense, performance-oriented architectures and delivering superior performance, reliability, efficiency and scale.”
The E5500 expands enterprise data protection with the SANtricity suite of data replication features and flexible interface offerings with 10G iSCSI and 16G FC, in addition to SAS and IB. With AutoSupport, users have enterprise monitoring and installed-base analytics for proactive operations. In addition, the E5500 scales to 1.5 petabytes per system for data-intensive storage.
In early November, NetApp reaffirmed its commitment to help accelerate the deployment of cloud services by announcing new contributions to OpenStack, and deeper integration with its storage and data management systems.
The company’s latest contributions included new solutions for OpenStack Havana, incubation of a new core service for OpenStack Icehouse and an expansion of support for partners and customers.
NetApp’s OpenStack Block Storage (also known as Cinder) integrations in Havana enable block storage services that support both cloud-native and traditional enterprise applications. NetApp’s Havana integrations with OpenStack Image and Compute also enable accelerated instance creation and storage capacity efficiencies when creating multiple like instances.
The contributions to OpenStack provide closely integrated access to storage efficiency, data protection, availability, scalability, and quality-of-services features designed to accelerate and simplify delivery of differentiated cloud services.