HDS adds top of the line models in both its all-flash F series, and hybrid flash G series, as well as the new SVOS 7 operating system.
Peter Kriparos, Head, Strategic Alliances, at HDS Canada
Hitachi Data Systems (HDS), has made a series of announcements which better leverage flash in their Virtual Storage Platform G series and F series systems, as well as in SVOS 7, the next generation of the Hitachi Storage Virtualization Operating System (SVOS) that powers them.
The new SVOS 7 is available on all new and existing Virtual Storage Platform G series and F series, and is available to existing customers through a non-disruptive upgrade.
“SVOS 7 is historically the best platform for virtualizing all heterogeneous ones – including our competitors,” said Peter Kriparos, Head, Strategic Alliances, at HDS Canada. “We have made further enhancements with this generation of the software. It all ties back to our holistic approach around mobility, analytics, and management, including flash. It also keeps things in the context of where we are coming from in the enterprise market, and shows a commitment to its needs.”
A key improvement is leveraging flash in a flash-aware I/O stack, something that had been missing in prior versions of the software.
“It now is flash-aware and fully leverages flash,” Kriparos said. “Before, as it had been for managing all virtual logical units, it viewed all technologies as the same, and didn’t recognize spinning disk versus flash.”
Kriparos said that being flash-aware improves Quality of Service.
“It makes it possible to move dynamic workloads more effectively and crates more predictable performance,” he said.
“Our adaptive data reduction feature, which is a selective deduplication, is also enhanced by the use of flash technologies,” Kriparos added. SVOS 7 can offload compression to Hitachi flash modules for more scalable data reduction.
Another flash-related enhancement is new cloud tiering for the all-flash VSP F series.
“This now provides the ability to move files to cloud tiering like AWS or Azure,” Kriparos said.
HDS is also announcing two new VSP models, one aimed at the high end, and one at the lower part of the enterprise. The higher end one is the VSP F1500, HDS’ top of the line product in the all-flash space. It is built on HDS’s own new high-density FMDs with raw capacities of up to 14TB. It delivers over 4.8 million IOPS and up to 40PB of effective flash capacity, and scales to 576 FMDs.
The hybrid offering, the VSP G1500, is also the high end of its product line. It also offers 4.8 million IOPS – 20 per cent more than the VSPG1000, the next model down the line. HDS is pitching the hybrid flash at businesses looking to transition to all-flash over time – not an uncommon strategy these days as the price of flash continues to drop rapidly.
“The VSP G1500 is more of an entry level enterprise product, which has all the 100 per cent uptime guarantees and the capability to work well in both open systems and mainframe environments,” Kriparos said.
Along with the new OS, HDS is also upgrading its management stack to simplify data management.
“The new version of Hitachi Storage Advisor is key here, with its expanded control of the VSP G series and all flash capabilities,” Kriparos said. “It has the ability to do data reduction management, and its enhancements around SVOS 7’s adminstrative capabilities will help customers struggling with competencies around specific storage. New versions of Automation Director and Infrastructure Analytics Advisor have also been added, to let customers more easily implement new SVOS 7 functions.
“This is very much a launch where we have already gone to a select number of partners, and provided them with prelaunch training,” Kriparos said. “Partner capability here will be key to providing solutions that will help drive customers digital transformation and positive outcomes.”
