October 16, 2009 – I spent most of this week at the Storage Networking World (SNW) show in Phoenix. For the past couple years I’ve been advocating that SNW management consider (a) collapsing the show into one event per year and (b) getting more storage channel professionals (VARs and integrators) to attend and participate in the show.
I’ve changed my mind on (a). Assuming reports of a turnaround in IT spending have not been greatly exaggerated, I think the storage industry needs, and can sustain, two SNWs per year. Although attendance, the number of exhibitors, and product introductions were way down compared to the show’s heyday, it’s still a vibrant forum for the exchange of information between vendors, users and the channel.
And there did seem to be more channel presence at this week’s show.
In addition to meeting with a boatload of vendors, industry analysts and some end users, I had an interesting dinner with a startup that doesn’t fit into any of those categories: the Channel Chargers. Since they’re based in San Diego, their company name is even cooler than it seems.
Basically, Channel Chargers delivers an active link between vendors and reseller/integrators, providing channel strategies and also connecting vendors and VARs. Other outfits do this, but the management team at Channel Chargers has more channel experience than the other outfits, with a strong focus on storage.
If you’re a vendor, particularly if you’re a startup, that needs to establish or expand relationships in the channel, or a VAR looking for some interesting new products to sell, check out the Channel Chargers.
Back to SNW: There weren’t many products introduced at the show, but for a quick rundown of announcements see “Product highlights from SNW.”
As for the Most Interesting Product, I’d give that award to WhipTail Technologies, a startup specializing in solid-state disk (SSD) appliances
WhipTail introduced the Racerunner version of its SSD appliances, which include Exar’s Hifn BitWackr data deduplication and compression cards and software. The configuration provides an inline (as opposed to post-processing) capacity optimization appliance for primary storage. The SSD appliances are available in 1.5TB, 3TB and 6TB versions.
James Candelaria, WhipTail’s CTO, claims a minimum 10:1 deduplication ratio in virtual server environments, and on average 2:1 to 4:1 optimization ratios in non-virtual server environments (although deduplication ratios vary widely depending on data types). Factoring in the overhead associated with compression and deduplication, Candelaria cites performance of 60,000 I/Os per second (IOPS) on reads and 25,000 to 30,000 IOPS on writes, although the company has not completed its testing of the Racerunner appliances with the BitWackr cards. The deduplication/compression cards are offered at no extra charge.
Bottom line: When you combine compression and deduplication with the falling prices of SSDs, you approach price parity between SSDs and HDDs.
WhipTail also launched its VIPER channel partner program.
Overall, at SNW I sensed a level of optimism that hasn’t been present at the show for the last two years or so, both in terms of the general storage business and the show itself. I hope they can maintain the 2x/year format.
Showing posts with label WhipTail. Show all posts
Showing posts with label WhipTail. Show all posts
Friday, October 16, 2009
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
WhipTail: Software solves MLC SSD issues
July 29, 2009 – One of the more promising developments in the solid-state disk (SSD) drive space is the potential use of low-cost multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash memory in enterprise applications and arrays, vs. the high-cost – but more reliable and durable – single-level cell (SLC) technology, as I mentioned in my previous post (see “Intel slashes SSD prices” ). This can basically be accomplished in two ways: via software or via controller enhancements.
Relative newcomer WhipTail Technologies is an example of a vendor that’s using software techniques to overcome some of the inherent limitations of MLC flash memory; namely, write amplification issues that limit the ability of NAND to perform random writes in an effective manner (a performance issue), and wear-out issues (a reliability, or durability, or endurance problem).
To address the performance part of the equation, WhipTail uses buffering (not caching) techniques, in which writes are aggregated into a buffer that’s sized to the erase block of the NAND, according to WhipTail CTO James Candelaria, who claims that this technique enables performance close to the performance specs of the NAND media.
Specifically, the company claims performance of more than 100,000 I/Os per second (IOPS) of sustained, random I/O with 4KB block sizes and a 70/30 read/write split. Other performance specs include a latency of 0.1 milliseconds, and bandwidth of 1.7GBps (internal to the chassis).
The other major problem with MLC flash is wear-out. For example, SLC is rated at about 100,000 cycles per cell, while MLC is rated at only 10,000 cycles/cell before the cell becomes unreliable (and that may go down to 2,000 to 4,000 writes/cell with smaller die sizes).
To address the wear-out issue, WhipTail uses a technique called linearization, which essentially entails writing forward across the disk and not revisiting blocks until the entire array has been utilized. This not only decreases wear on the media, but also increases performance. Working in conjunction with linearization, a defrag process ensures that there is always a minimum amount of free space. This technique also works in conjunction with the drive’s wear-leveling algorithms.
The company’s internal tests indicate that if you rewrite an entire array once a day, the device will last seven years (or longer than most other components in the storage hierarchy).
You can get the details on these two techniques on WhipTail’s web site, as well as details on their products, but what about pricing?
Candelaria contends that WhipTail “provides tier-0 [SSD] performance at the price of tier-1 arrays.”
Well, a 1.5TB WhipTail SSD array is priced at $46,000 retail; a 3TB version at $75,600; and the new 6TB configuration, introduced this month, at $122,500.
Summit NJ-based WhipTail was spun out of TheAdmins, a reseller, early this year and has been working on its SSD technology since late 2007. Its first product went GA in February. The company sells through resellers, with eight VARs signed up so far.
For more information on SSDs, see InfoStor’s SSD Topic Center.
And if you’re really interested in solid-state technology, consider attending the Flash Memory Summit, August 11—13 at the Santa Clara Convention Center.
Relative newcomer WhipTail Technologies is an example of a vendor that’s using software techniques to overcome some of the inherent limitations of MLC flash memory; namely, write amplification issues that limit the ability of NAND to perform random writes in an effective manner (a performance issue), and wear-out issues (a reliability, or durability, or endurance problem).
To address the performance part of the equation, WhipTail uses buffering (not caching) techniques, in which writes are aggregated into a buffer that’s sized to the erase block of the NAND, according to WhipTail CTO James Candelaria, who claims that this technique enables performance close to the performance specs of the NAND media.
Specifically, the company claims performance of more than 100,000 I/Os per second (IOPS) of sustained, random I/O with 4KB block sizes and a 70/30 read/write split. Other performance specs include a latency of 0.1 milliseconds, and bandwidth of 1.7GBps (internal to the chassis).
The other major problem with MLC flash is wear-out. For example, SLC is rated at about 100,000 cycles per cell, while MLC is rated at only 10,000 cycles/cell before the cell becomes unreliable (and that may go down to 2,000 to 4,000 writes/cell with smaller die sizes).
To address the wear-out issue, WhipTail uses a technique called linearization, which essentially entails writing forward across the disk and not revisiting blocks until the entire array has been utilized. This not only decreases wear on the media, but also increases performance. Working in conjunction with linearization, a defrag process ensures that there is always a minimum amount of free space. This technique also works in conjunction with the drive’s wear-leveling algorithms.
The company’s internal tests indicate that if you rewrite an entire array once a day, the device will last seven years (or longer than most other components in the storage hierarchy).
You can get the details on these two techniques on WhipTail’s web site, as well as details on their products, but what about pricing?
Candelaria contends that WhipTail “provides tier-0 [SSD] performance at the price of tier-1 arrays.”
Well, a 1.5TB WhipTail SSD array is priced at $46,000 retail; a 3TB version at $75,600; and the new 6TB configuration, introduced this month, at $122,500.
Summit NJ-based WhipTail was spun out of TheAdmins, a reseller, early this year and has been working on its SSD technology since late 2007. Its first product went GA in February. The company sells through resellers, with eight VARs signed up so far.
For more information on SSDs, see InfoStor’s SSD Topic Center.
And if you’re really interested in solid-state technology, consider attending the Flash Memory Summit, August 11—13 at the Santa Clara Convention Center.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)