Data Center Enters Flash Age

Since the acquisition of Fusion-IO, an enterprise flash solution provider, SanDisk has grown faster and faster in the enterprise flash memory market. Brian Cox, Senior Director of SanDisk Enterprise Storage Markets, stated that the data center has entered the flash era. SanDisk has been fully prepared for this.

In the future, will all enterprise-level data center storage use all-flash arrays? As early as two years ago, there have been flash makers making positive predictions. Today, we clearly see that solid-state drives have greatly accelerated the speed of replacing traditional mechanical hard drives. Flash memory has entered the data center and has played an increasingly important role in critical applications. Brian Cox, SanDisk’s senior director of enterprise-level storage marketing, said in an interview: “The data center has entered the flash era. SanDisk has been fully prepared for this.”

Build an ecosystem

A report released by IDC in 2014 showed that 51% of data centers in the world have adopted flash memory as the main way to improve I/O performance of storage systems. In the next 12 months, another 49% of data centers also plan to use flash memory. Today, flash memory has become an indispensable storage medium within the data center.

"Either from the feedback of enterprise users or the comments of the entire storage industry, the application of flash memory in the enterprise has passed the initial stage of being questioned. Even if it is measured from the perspective of reliability that enterprise customers value most, The performance of enterprise flash products is also very good." Brian Cox said, "At present, a major obstacle to the large-scale adoption of flash memory in enterprise applications is that many enterprise customers are not yet clear on how to correctly use flash memory, and where can the flash memory be deployed? Because of the role and value of flash memory, as a vendor, we cannot provide only a single product, but we should provide a total solution to help users analyze the problems of the storage system from an application perspective and how to properly deploy flash memory. ."

What makes flash so quickly enter the enterprise data center? Very simple, it is the user's needs. As the amount of data increases geometrically, and applications such as cloud computing and big data increase, enterprise-level users place higher demands on the instant access performance of IT systems. From a performance point of view, flash memory is clearly the best choice at present. From an economic point of view, even enterprise users who are “not bad” will pursue better cost-effectiveness when building IT infrastructure. Compared with traditional mechanical hard disks or disk arrays, SSDs and all-flash arrays can reduce the power consumption and cooling costs of storage systems, while reducing the number of racks and floor space, as well as the number of servers and storage arrays, and ultimately achieving overall ownership. Cost optimization.

Although from a technical point of view, compared with the traditional disk and storage arrays, flash memory has certain advantages, but from the application point of view, flash memory if you want to achieve the replacement of traditional storage, there is still a lot of work to be done, such as how the flash memory Application software for optimization. "Enterprise customers always have their application habits. Initially, when replacing a traditional storage system with a new flash solution, enterprise customers may have some concerns or concerns, such as flash security, availability, etc." Brian Cox analysis Said, "In order to promote the popularity of flash memory in the enterprise data center, one of the important tasks we must do is to establish a solution ecosystem with a flash memory application as the core and to absorb software vendors and solution providers at all levels."

From a global perspective, flash memory has become a major trend in the data center. So what obstacles are there in flash memory for enterprise applications in China?

Zhang Zixi, vice president of enterprise business in SanDisk Asia Pacific, said: “From the point of view of global enterprise flash memory applications, the data centers of telecom operators are basically using flash memory. In terms of database applications, flash memory solutions replace traditional SANs. Database application acceleration has become a common practice, and as cloud computing, big data, and other applications increase, enterprise users cannot fully meet the performance and storage capacity expansion requirements when deploying new services. It will often shift new applications to all-flash platforms, which will not only improve performance, but also reduce the overall cost of ownership and speed up the deployment. This situation is already common in foreign countries."

Zhang Zixi also pointed out that from the perspective of application of new technologies, China will usually be a few years later than abroad, and flash memory is no exception.

"Actually, 'late' does not mean that Chinese users have a slower understanding of the new flash memory technology, but that it is later than the actual deployment and application of flash memory. Some Chinese customers are indeed conservative, the traditional procurement process and deployment The method has hindered the process of flash memory applications.” Zhang Zixi says that, “Since the previous year, SanDisk’s flash memory customers in China have gradually increased. For example, China Mobile's reading base cooperates with SanDisk and uses SanDisk's flash memory solutions to enhance users. The speed of reading books online: Several major telecom operators in China have adopted SanDisk's flash memory solutions to varying degrees. Other industries also have forward-looking customers who have deployed SanDisk's flash memory solutions. Now, many users are In the process of replacement of old and new systems, our job is to help customers more quickly, efficiently, and securely migrate their business to a flash-based architecture."

Replacement is taking place

Flash has just been used as a cache when it enters enterprise applications. No matter what the scale or price of the application, compared with the traditional mechanical hard disk, there is no advantage, let alone alternative. However, as flash memory technology matures and prices continue to decline, especially after a major breakthrough in the type and scope of applications, the use of flash memory as a replacement for hard disks is increasing. In the consumer product market, the trend of hard disk replacement by flash memory has become apparent. In the enterprise market, flash replacement is also happening. Hard disk manufacturers began to strengthen the development of flash memory products and mergers and acquisitions.

Enterprise customers often have large IT systems and applications are complex. If the entire data center is migrated to the all-flash architecture, many applications and people may be affected. Therefore, when migrating, we must carefully consider and formulate a comprehensive and detailed strategy. On the other hand, some companies may find it easier to adopt all-flash solutions when they build new data centers or deploy new services, rather than binding to old data centers or old services. Zhang Zixi believes that this is a new direction of development. Another trend worth watching is data stratification. Data tiering can distinguish between hot data and cold data. Hot data is stored on flash memory. Cold data is stored on hard disks. This can further optimize costs and facilitate long-term data retention. "For enterprise customers, they are more concerned about how to use the data to make more profits and make more money. To achieve data tiering and store hot data on flash memory, real-time data access and interaction can be realized. In some applications is very necessary, can bring more benefits for the company." Zhang Zixi said.

Speaking of the future development trend of flash memory technology, Brian Cox mentioned NVMe. SanDisk Corporation itself is one of the important sponsors of the NVMe organization. "We will follow NVMe's development direction and adopt NVMe technology in different product lines, including SATA and PCIe flash products." Brian Cox told reporters, "NVMe's development also depends on the construction of the ecosystem. At present, NVMe can not be commercialized. Because we do not have a sound ecosystem, we will look for more business partners to jointly promote the construction of the ecosystem, and at the same time promote the commercialization of NVMe.With the continuous improvement of technology, in 2017, NVMe is likely to achieve large-scale commercial use. ."