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| SAS SSD news |
OCZ's SAS SSDs in
InfiniBand benchmark configuration
Editor:- June 12, 2013 -
Mellanox
today announced
details of a benchmark demonstration it did this week showing its
FDR 56Gb/s
InfiniBand running
on Windows Server 2012 in a system which uses OCZ's
Talos 2R SSDs (2.5"
SAS SSDs) working with
LSI's
Fast
Path I/O acceleration software and RAID controllers - getting over 10GB/s
throughput to a remote file system while consuming under 5% of CPU overhead.
SMART samples 2TB $3,999 SAS SSD
Editor:- April 30,
2013 - SMART
Storage Systems today
announced
it is sampling a new 2.5" SAS SSD with 2TB capacity (oem price under
$4,000).
Using 19nm
MLC - the 100K/45K R/W IOPS -
Optimus
Eco - is rated at 10 drive writes per day
endurance.
Kaminario drops PCIe and turns to SAS to get costs down in new
HA rackmount
Editor:- April 18, 2013 - "You don't have to be
an investment bank like JP Morgan to afford our style of fast, scalable high
availability SSD systems any more" - was the key message I got talking to
Phil Williams,
VP Business Development at Kaminario earlier
this week when discussing with me aspects of the company's newest series of
FC SAN compatible SSD
arrays - the
K2 v4 (6TB usable per U at a cost of $10K to $15K per TB) which was
launched
yesterday.
Phil was referring to the expectation that their products -
which in the first generation were entirely
RAM based SSDs - and
then moved onto RAM / flash hybrids and then mostly pure flash (the flash
components being implemented in the previous generation of K2's by
Fusion-io's PCIe SSDs
- a relationship direction which I suggested in a much earlier briefing
conversation with Kaminario's CEO few years ago BTW ) - had acquired a
reputation of being out of reach pricewise - and not just in a class of their
own for resilience and
scalability.
One
of the ways that Kaminario has pulled off the affordability trick is to drop
PCIe SSDs as the internal flash components and use instead
SAS SSDs.
I've
said before that in the enterprise arrays space - "SAS is the new SATA"
- because there are so many companies which have moved into this segment
that there's stiff competition. Unlike the PCIe SSD market -which is mostly sold
on high performance - the SAS market includes a number of vendors who have been
using adaptive
R/W ECC to enable them to use cheap flash to build reliable
fast-enough SSDs
Because Kaminario still has a lot of
RAM cache in
its server based architecture - it doesn't need the raw
endurance
and performance of
FIO's ioMemory to deliver multi-gigabyte throughput at the rack level. And
another factor is that Fusion-io itself is on course to become a significant
supplier of rackmount SSDs (although not aimed at the same kind of customers.)
Kaminario didn't want to say which SAS product they're using. They
might say later. But it doesn't really matter.
The K2 v4 also
demonstrates that the key IP component in Kaminario's box is SSD software.
When I suggested that future boxes could equally well discard SAS SSDs if
2.5" PCIe SSDs
offered a better set of characteristics - Phil agreed that the company wasn't
tied to any particular internal SSD drive form factor or interface.
Kaminario
has paid Taneja Group
to do some new testing on the performance aspects of simulated hard faults.
These will be very useful for customers - and take the uncertainty out of the
picture - giving hard numbers for various scenarios.
For example - when
running at just under 200K
IOPS and
5GB/s throughput - an entire node (controller) was removed to simulate a fault.
I/O resumed after 23 seconds and performance dropped by less than 15% for 2
minutes before recovering fully.
Micron enters SAS SSD market
Editor:- February 26,
2013 - Micron
today became the 19th company to enter the
SAS SSD market.
The
company today
announced
production of its new
P410m
SSD - a 2.5" SSD
with R/W speeds upto 410MB/s and 345MB/s respectively and 50K/30K
R/W IOPS
for the 400GB model which uses 25nm MLC.
Endurance is
10 drive fills per day for 5 years.
Editor's comments:- Micron
is currently the only company manufacturing both
PCIe and
SAS compatible
enterprise SSDs in the 2.5" form factor.
STEC launches 2TB SAS SSD
Editor:- January 28, 2013 -
One of the oddest linking ideas I've ever seen in an SSD news story appeared
today in a
press
release from STEC
which suggests that anyone should care that the company is the first in the
market to launch both a 2TB PCIe SSD ($9,425) and a 2TB SAS SSD ($7,995).
This
marketing communication undervalues the true achievement of a 2TB
SAS drive (assuming it
fits in a standard height - unlike a previous model).
Also nearly
lost in this mixed up marketing communication is the idea that STEC is offering
"Unlimited Writes" on some variations of these products. (Which
endurance
goal is possible using a variety of different techniques - at the extremes
being slower performance, using more expensive flash or RAM caching - I haven't
asked which of these applies.)
Toshiba samples encrypted SAS SSD
Editor:- January 6,
2013 - Toshiba
says
it's sampling a new range of 2.5" SAS MLC SSDs - with self
encrypting security
features and on board
sanitization.
The PX02SMQ/U has upto 1.6TB capacity.
OCZ's CEO says "we've got the train back on the track"
Editor:-
November 30, 2012 - OCZ's
CEO, Ralph
Schmitt -
said
yesterday in an analyst discussion reported by Reuters that the company
isn't looking to be acquired and he doesn't think it will have any difficulties
getting more cash at a reasonable cost.
Samsung enters dual port SAS SSD market
Editor:-
October 31, 2012 - Samsung
today announced its belated entry into the serious end of the
SAS SSD market with
the launch of its 1st dual port SAS SSD - the
SM1625
(2Xnm flash) has upto 800GB capacity and upto 101,000 / 23,000
R/W IOPS
(when using both ports. It also includes
sudden power
loss data protection.
Samsung also launched today new models
of fast-enough
SATA SSDs - the
SM843 - with endurance
rated at 1064TBW (terabytes written) - which doesn't sound that great to me -
but is (according to their own press release) 17x better than what
they had before.
"Samsung will aggressively produce its new
line-up of SSDs beginning this month to accelerate SSDs' move into not only the
server but also the storage marketplace, as we continue to affirm our leadership
in the SSD market." said Myungho Kim VP of SSD marketing at
Samsung.
Smart's MLC SAS SSD beats SLC rivals - says StorageReview.com
Editor:- October 10, 2012 - The performance of some leading
SAS SSDs were compared
in a recent
report
published yesterday in StorageReview.com which compared the latest
adaptive R/W
technology based MLC drives from Smart Storage
with older SLC SAS SSDs from SanDisk, HGST and Toshiba.
The
review said Smart's Optimus was the performance leader in nearly all tests,
although there was one serious blip and performance outage which looks to me
like it may require a firmware fix.
A serious flaw in this review
was, however, the absence of any modern MLC products from
STEC*.
Despite
that the performance comparisons of these 6Gbps drives does convincingly
demonstrate that overall enterprise SSD design is more important than raw
memory type (one of the tenets in the
enterprise
SSD survivor's guide).
How important is this review? Anyone who's
already shipping boxes populated with merchant market SAS SSDs will already
be aware of the potential suppliers - but it might give them another reason to
look at Smart to prune their costs. But when it comes to performance? - I'm not
so sure it's useful - as 12Gbps SAS SSDs have already having been demonstrated
by several vendors in prototype form earlier this year and that's the
direction oems will be looking at for ultimate SAS performance in the
future... Apart from those who are thinking about switching to
2.5" PCIe SSDs.
*
A month later - StorageReview.com did publish a
review
of STEC's MLC SAS SSD - the s840. In this comparison Smart beats STEC on
peak performance - but STEC's performance is more consistent. However, STEC's
SSD doesn't fit into the same low profile space.
BiTMICRO's new TALINO based SAS SSDs in Beta
Editor:-
September 12, 2012 - I noticed today that some new pages have appeared on BiTMICRO's website
which unveil and outline
a range -
called maxIO - of enterprise SSDs (SATA,
SAS and
PCIe) which use the
company's new TALINO SSD controller and hint at "100K to 400K IOPS (4KB)
performance" - depending on which model you look at. The company is
offering beta test samples
to suitable people who sign an NDA.
SMART proliferates adaptive DSP IP in SAS SSDs
Editor:-
July 5, 2012 - SMART
Storage Systems recently
announced
it's sampling yet another new variant of
SAS SSD which uses
adaptive
flash DSP technology - the
Optimus
Ultra+ is a 2.5"
SSD with 100K/60K R/W
IOPS - which
can endure
50 full random drive writes per day for a period of 5 years using commercial MLC
NAND flash technology. ...read
more in SSD news
2.5" PCIe SSDs guide
Editor:- May 21, 2012 - StorageSearch.com today published
a new article introducing the market for
2.5" PCIe SSDs
.
Although some aspects of this new market are predictable - if
you're already familiar with
PCIe SSDs and
SAS SSDs - the new SSD
delivery package also opens up new possibilities which can sit above and below
pre-existing 2.5"SSDs in price as well as performance. And the new 2.5"
PCIe SSDs will also introduce and showcase new types of functionality which
haven't been been feasible before at the SSD drive level.
...read the
article
HGST claims first demonstration of 2x faster SAS SSD
Editor:-
May 1, 2012 - HGST
today
announced
successful demonstrations of the industry's first 12Gb/s
SAS SSD.
"We
have successfully achieved interoperability between our 12Gb/s SAS drive and
12Gb/s SAS HBAs and expanders from both
LSI and
PMC-Sierra" said
Brendan Collins, VP of product marketing, HGST.
Editor's
comments:- no great surprises here if you read the SSD performance roadmap
published here 4 years ago. The new challenge for SAS SSDs in this speed class
- will be cannibalization from hot-swap 2.5"
PCIe SSDs like those
from Micron.
EMC arrays will have WD SAS SSDs inside
Editor:-
March 5, 2012 - Hitachi
GST today
announced
that its 2.5"
SAS
SLC SSD
product - the
Ultrastar
SSD400S - is now shipping in EMC's
VNX
iSCSI arrays.
Editor's
comments:- after more than a year of waiting -
WD obtained all
required regulatory approvals for its acquisition of HGST which closed this
week.
SMART-inside SAS SSDs - offer credible competitive alternative
for tier-1
Editor:- February 22, 2012 - SMART Storage Systems
launched the
Optimus
Ultra (a 1.2TB 2.5" 100K/60K IOPS, 500MB/s R/W
SAS SSD) which uses
the company's new, in-house developed, high reliability enterprise SSD
controller IP - which includes DSP and adaptive programming techniques to
deliver industry leading SSD data integrity and upto 25x / day full disk
writes for 5 years endurance - while using low cost consumer grade MLC.
STEC prospecting for more enterprise SSD business
Editor:-
January 17, 2012 - STEC
announced that industry veteran Vaughn Miller has joined the company's
Systems and Software Group as VP of Business Development.
Mr. Miller
is responsible for developing business opportunities with OEMs and ISVs that
focus on enterprise
applications.
During the past 16 years, Mr. Miller held various key
management positions in business development for
Cisco Systems,
NeoPath Networks,
Acopia
Networks (acquired by F5 Networks, Inc.),
NetApp and
Auspex Systems. Prior to
his roles in business development, Mr. Miller served as an engineer for
Landmark
Graphics (a Halliburton company) and
Modcomp. |
|
| OCZ samples
terabyte dual port 6Gbps 2.5" SAS SSDs |
Editor:- November 29, 2011 -
OCZ has started
sampling
dual port 6Gbps
SAS SSDs in a smaller
form factor - the
Talos
2 SAS SSD provides upto 70,000 4K
IOPS
(75R/25W) and upto 1TB capacity in
2.5" (previously
only available from the company in the larger
3.5" size).
To
cater for different applications and markets OCZ is offering
MLC, eMLC, and
SLC NAND flash versions. The new SSDs include protection against
sudden power
loss and have the option to enable
T10-DIF (Data
Integrity Field) in addition to the native
SandForce SSD data
integrity to ensure end to end data integrity.
Editor's comments:- which of these 2 new SAS SSDs will be
better for you? - The ZeusIOPS XE (from STEC) or the Talos 2 (from OCZ).
One
thing's for sure - you can't just decide from looking at the press releases.
Price is
a very important factor too - particularly if your app involves heavy duty
caching - you may decide that to get the same
reliability you
end up comparing an MLC SSD managed by CellCare (the STEC offer) to an eMLC
(or even SLC) SSD managed by DuraClass (the OCZ offer).
Or based on
your past experience with these suppliers you may apply your own
adjustment factor to their price projections and reliability projections.
Or based on who you are - you may not score highly enough to
get your hands on early evaluation samples at all.
And that's before
you even start looking at what
SanDisk might do with
their Lightning or what
WD might do with
the Ultrastar when they get it from Hitachi GST.
One consolation may
be that there are less controllers
to choose from in the SAS market than when you look at
PCIe SSDs.
STEC samples Extreme Endurance SAS MLC SSDs for caching
Editor:-
November 29, 2011 - STEC
has started sampling a new
high endurance
MLC SSD - based on its proprietary
CellCare technology
- the new ZeusIOPS
XE (Extreme Endurance) is a 6Gbps SAS SSD family, available in
1.8",
2.5" and
3.5" sizes (300GB
or 600GB) and supports at least 30 full capacity writes per day, every day,
for 5 years.
Latency is upto 50 microseconds. Sustained R/W throughput
is upto 500MB/s and 275MB/s respectively and random IOPS is upto 38,000 8K
(70R/30W). STEC says the new SSDs (based on 32nm MLC) are suited for
write-intensive applications with the high endurance necessary to support
server-side caching,
auto-tiering, metadata management and logging, and analytics.
SSD protection technology wins best of show award for SMART
Editor:-
August 15, 2011 - SMART
today
announced
that its Guardian
technology - which provides enterprise grade data integrity in MLC SSDs -
has been chosen by the Flash Memory
Summit as a Best of Show award winner for 2011 in the category of Most
Innovative Flash Memory Enterprise Business Application.
Editor's
comments:- SMART recently
launched
a new range of 2.5" SAS
SSDs which provide upto 1.6TB usable capacity, 100K/50K random IOPS and
500/500MB/s sustained transfer rates - which incoporate the above technologies.
SanDisk samples new SAS SSDs
Editor:- June 20,
2011 - SanDisk
has expanded its
Lightning
range (2.5"
and 3.5"
SAS
skinny flash
SSDs) which now offer upto 800GB MLC capacity are being delivered for OEM
qualification, and will be available via authorized channel partners in Q3,
2011.
The new Lightning SSDs (recently acquired from
Pliant) feature
Write Through Logging (WTL) technology which delivers high performance at low
queue depths to avoid volatility that would otherwise require battery back-up or
supercapacitors for protection. WTL operation is completely transparent to the
host and maintains a predictable performance profile across different workloads.
This write cache-less design
eliminating
data loss on power interruptions, delivering consistent performance across a
wide range of workloads.
See also:-
Power, Speed and
Strength Metaphors in SSD brands,
Pliant Technology -
SSD Bookmarks.
OCZ samples new SAS SSD
Editor:- May 15, 2011 -
OCZ is sampling a
new 3.5"
SAS SSD in its
Talos
family.
The new product has upto 960GB MLC capacity and upto 60K
IOPS.
Seagate's new 2.5" SAS SSDs
Editor:- March 15,
2011 - Seagate
announced details of new
2.5"
SAS SSDs -
marketed under its Pulsar
brand - which
will ship in the 2nd quarter.
Available capacities are
400GB
(SLC) and
800GB
(MLC). R/W speeds are upto 360MB/s and 300MB/s respectively. Sustainable
random R/W IOPS
are 48K and 22K respectively.
Endurance is
quoted as 35 / 10 full drive writes per day SLC / MLC. Unrecoverable read
errors (data
integrity) for the SLC model are 1 in 1016 . Seagate also
quotes a permissive rate of ambient temperature change for its MLC SSD - which
is something else we may be hearing more about in future.
Editor's
comments:- one of the problems Seagate has in being a latecomer to the SSD
market is that it hasn't yet racked up enough "million customer operating
years" to support reliability messages tagged to the new SSD launch. So
instead it's using cross over references from its HDD business - as in this
statement - "Over 200 man-years of development went into the
2nd-generation Pulsar SSD products, with enterprise reliability verified by a
team with over 1,500 collective years of experience in the storage industry."
SSD market
history in recent years teaches us that experience in other markets
(even within the semiconductor industry) doesn't always guarantee that new
SSD designs will be as reliable,
trouble free or as
fast as their
creators anticipate. That's because many new design features in flash SSD
architectures get their first reality checks in the market. I expect that if
all goes well - next year Seagate's new SSD announcements will start referring
back to their SSD market track record. And if all doesn't go well - we're hear
about it on these news pages.
IBM uses SAS SSDs from SMART in supercomputer
Editor:-
November 22, 2010 - SMART
announced that
its
XceedIOPS SAS 2.5" solid state drive (SSD) will be used in new models
of IBM POWER7
supercomputers instead of hard drives.
John Scaramuzzo, General
Manager for SMART's Storage Business Unit said - "The selection criteria
for SSDs has moved beyond HDD replacement, as innovative designers such as those
at IBM use the qualities of enterprise-grade SSDs to significantly enhance their
products' performance, data integrity, and reliability."
Hitachi samples STEC / Pliant class enterprise SSDs
Editor:-
November 16, 2010 - Hitachi
announced
it was
sampling 3.5"
FC SSDs and
2.5"
SAS SSDs with upto
400GB SLC capacity and 535MB/s read and 500MB/s write throughput (6Gb/s SAS)
46,000 / 13,000 R/W
IOPS.
SandForce shows SSD controller for 6Gbps SAS
Editor:-
October 7, 2010 - SandForce
today
announced
availability of its next generation
SF-2000
family SSD processors - for oems designing
SAS 3 class (6Gbps)
enterprise
acceleration SSDs.
The SF-2000 supports 500MB/s sequential R/W,
60,000 sustained random IOPS, wire speed encryption, end to end
data integrity checks
and industrial temperature operation in a
skinny flash
SSD architecture.
Also new in this controller generation is support
for sector sizes additional to 512-bytes e.g., 520, 524, 528, 4K, etc., with
Data Integrity Field (DIF) for true enterprise-class SAS drive behavior and
performance.
Editor's comments:- one simple way of looking at
the SF-2000 would be as an incremental x2 version of what SandForce has
done before - which also demonstrates that the glass ceiling for their
architecture is much higher than some people might have thought.
In a
briefing yesterday I learned a lot more about the new chip and got answers from
SandForce to a bunch of technology and marketing questions. I'll post these in
more detail in a special article on the
SSD controllers page
tomorrow.
STEC samples 3.5" RAM SSD
Editor:- September 20,
2010 - STEC
today
announced
it is sampling a new 3.5"
dual port SAS
compatible RAM SSD - the
ZeusRAM SSD - with
8GB capacity and under 23 microseconds average latency and internal flash
backup.
Editor's comments:-
RAM SSDs don't have the
"play it
again Sam... as time goes by" syndrome inherent in
flash SSDs -
because they have genuinely low repeat write latency and can be 10x to 20x
faster. In some applications that's a difference
worth paying for.
The
1st 3.5" RAM SSD featured on these pages - was the
MegaRam-35 (in
June 2002) which was a parallel
SCSI SSD from Imperial
Technology. A year later in 2003 -
Curtis marketed a 3.5"
fibre-channel RAM SSD - the
HyperXCLR - which
for many years held the speed records in that form factor. The Curtis unit is
still available as too is a similar product from
Density Dynamics.
Pliant does U turn in $A$ SSDs
Editor:- September
8, 2010 - Pliant
Technology
announced it
is sampling MLC
versions of its 2.5" SAS SSD family with upto 400GB capacity and >10K
sustained IOPS.
Editor's
comments:- new dynasty SSD
maker Fusion-io has
successfully demonstrated that there is a healthy market appetite for MLC SSDs
in some "enterprise
apps". How many is "some"? Enough to make a
VC wake up in your
powerpoint presentation!
Most new
2.5" SSD makers
are taking the opposite route to Pliant in that the majority started with
consumer grade (MLC) SSD products with
SATA interfaces and
are busily reworking their products to add
SAS (spelt $A$) so
they can charge higher prices.
Pliant - on the other hand - made a
conservative choice by launching only SLC SSDs when it started sampling its 1st
SSDs 12 months ago. Will Pliant add
SATA SSDs to its line
up too? - Unlikely it could survive in that fiercely competitive market. But
if the company is still around in another 12 months - I wouldn't be surprised
to see them extend their range with a
PCIe SSD. Because you
have to give enterprise customers what they want. Even if the market appears
inconsistent about
what it wants. If the money is there you have to pay attention.
SMART samples 400GB 2.5" SAS eMLC SSD
Editor:-
August 17, 2010 - SMART
entered the crowding SAS
SSD market with the announcement that it is sampling the
XceedIOPS
SAS SSD - a 2.5" 400GB eMLC SSD with 26,000 / 20,000 R/W
IOPS and
250/230 MB/s sustained throughput.
The new XceedIOPS SAS SSD offers
high reliability and data integrity due to extensive error-correction and
detection capabilities, multi-level data-path and code protection, data-fail
recovery, and data-integrity monitoring. Designed to minimize power surges in
SSD arrays the the XceedIOPS SAS SSD supports staggered power-on.
Infortrend joins the STEC inside club
Editor:- July
22, 2010 - Infortrend
today
announced
it will use STEC's
ZeusIOPS (SAS SSDs) in
its ESVA F60 product line (FC
RAID systems).
and Super Talent... brings SAS SSD headcount to 14
Editor:-
June 21, 2010 - Super Talent
Technology entered the
2.5"
SAS SSD market by
announcing
imminent shipments of its ShuttleCraft brand - which includes SLC and MLC
models with capacities upto 240GB .
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