Flash is transforming the data center but storage speeds mean nothing if I/O bottle necks prevent businesses from achieving its potential ’Why? Think about high-speed train travel. You can’t just buy a fleet of high-speed engines and send them out on rails built for more moderate speeds. Likewise, a move to all flash storage should include a review of network decisions made in the years of spinning discs.
All Flash Storage Networking Requirements – Can You Say “Fibre Channel”?
Flash-based storage requires a network that is deterministic with low latencies and is easy to manage. Fibre Channel has always delivered low latency, deterministic behavior, scalability and reliability. Fibre Channel also has a higher assumed quality of service and provides six 9s reliability. Fibre Channel was designed to use the Layer 2 network protocol, which requires less CPU utilization to encapsulate a payload than is required by storage over IP networks, which means the architecture of Fibre Channel itself provides inherent value.
So…Modernize Your SAN to Keep Pace with the Accelerated I/Os of All Flash Environments
Today’s Fibre Channel storage networking products now include exclusive diagnostic and error-collection capabilities, as well as the ability to monitor, analyze and identify specific data to avoid errors, reduce bottlenecks and optimize resources.
Since Flash also paves the way for higher Virtual Machine (VM) density, Fibre Channel’s massive scalability allows the network to adapt to increasing VM densities enabling break through performance.
Today’s 16 Gigabit per second (16Gb/S) Fibre Channel speeds can be seamlessly introduced into your new all flash storage environment to provide the bandwidth your Flash workloads require. Even if you still have 8GB capable servers or other systems attached, upgrading to a modern SAN will bring scalability and performance benefits to your entire Flash environment.
Thinking About Flash? Think About Including A Network Assessment
Bottom line, an all-flash storage environment can transform your IT, but if you want to get the maximum benefit from your investment, include a storage network assessment.