NetApp Goes For Performance With All-Flash Option For New FAS8080 EX

NetApp on Tuesday replaced its highest-performance FAS storage solution with a new model that not only provides increased performance but also is available in an all-flash storage configuration.

The company also refreshed its entry-level line with increased performance and capacity, thereby completing a refresh of its entire FAS line of storage solutions.

New at NetApp is the FAS8080 EX, the company's highest-performing storage solution featuring new Intel processors and the ability to be configured with up to 5 petabytes of all-flash storage capacity, or 500 TB of flash storage used as a cache with up to 70 petabytes of hard disk capacity in a hybrid solution, said Nathan Moffitt, director of storage platforms at NetApp.

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The FAS8080 EX, which replaces NetApp's FAS6290 and FAS6250 as the company's highest-end storage solution, also scales to up to 4 million IOPS (IOs per second), Moffitt told CRN.

NetApp also unveiled the FAS2500, a new entry-level model that Moffitt said replaces the company's older FAS2200 series. The FAS2500 features expanded flash support to accelerate workloads by over 40 percent and increase capacity by nearly 50 percent compared to the previous models, he said.

"This is the completed strategic refresh of our FAS platform we started in February with the introduction of the FAS8000 family," Moffitt said. "The focus here is on scale-out. We could do scale-out before, but now it's completely integrated with our Clustered Data OnTap operating system."

The FAS8080 EX is NetApp's fastest solution ever, with all the latest features, said John Woodall, vice president of engineering at Integrated Archive Systems (IAS), a Palo Alto, Calif.-based solution provider and longtime NetApp partner.

"It's what you'd expect," Woodall said.

What's unique is how well NetApp has engineered the solution to take advantage of the higher core count of the new Intel processors, Woodall said. "NetApp has improved the threading of its OnTap operating system and WAFL file system to take advantage of those cores," he said. "This has big performance implications, especially in the all-flash configuration."

NetApp is blending increased performance with the ability to handle both SAN and NAS workloads with its FAS8080 EX, said Victor Villegas, vice president of business development and alliances at CMT, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based solution provider and NetApp channel partner.

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"The FAS8080 EX is unique in its ability to meet the workload needs of customers moving to the cloud," Villegas told CRN. "It handles the need for high performance and low latency without a high price."

CMT will target the new FAS8080 EX at larger enterprise customers, especially telcos, who are looking at how to scale flash storage in their data centers, Villegas said.

"This is a solution large services providers should be looking at," he said. "They may be using low-cost servers to provide services, but need a solution like this to manage their operations."

The new FAS2500 solutions target the commercial enterprise market for customers with under 2,500 seats but who need a hybrid flash and disk array to support operations and the cloud, Villegas said.

"It's interesting to see a product refresh that addresses the needs of both large enterprises and the commercial spaces," he said. "We're excited."

PUBLISHED JUNE 17, 2014