'Complete Array Virtualisation Is Unique To EVAs'

QQ Li, product manager, Enterprise Virtual Array (EVA) and SAN Infrastructure, HP Storage Works Division, Asia Pacific and Japan, explains how EVAs are the next-generation data storage solutions and how they can save costs in today’s environment.

How are virtual array storage solutions different from traditional architected storage?

To explain this, I must tell you about an event that we organised recently in the US, where we got six high school students and divided them into three groups. Each group was given an EVA and two other competitor products and they were asked to conduct the server virtualisation process. This was done by each of the groups on each of the servers and we did three rounds and each time EVA was a clear winner. The fact that even a high school student after a crash course can conduct a demo speaks volumes about the simplicity of the product.

Also, these products are highly customisable. Similarly, in the event of the user adding additional discs, it gets auto-levelled on its own. Traditionally, you had to manually adjust it. And typically, in the lifecycle of a traditional array, it has to be totally re–initialised at least once because the more capacity you add the more complicated it gets. So that’s the major difference as far as the utilization point-of-view is concerned.

The installation and interface too is very simple, specifically with regard to connectivity and we are offering a special tool called ‘SmartStart’ through which you can start operating the server in 20 minutes once the physical cabling is done. Typically, traditional arrays were charged for a day or two for start-up but with our technology and expertise you can be up and running in about 20 minutes.

The other perspective is of course the ‘green’ one. One is the increase in the capacity utilisation meaning in the same scenario we eat up less disc space. For arrays, power consumption is more on the discs, and a typical array can have hundreds of them; so the less discs you use the less power you consume.

As far as SAN level virtualisation is concerned, we provide a central management interface, which allows you to handle heterogeneous management of the back end arrays effectively.

How would you compare your products as against those of other players in the array business?

As far as EVA is concerned, I don’t think we have real competition in the market. There are some products from EMC and there is IBM Polebox PS 4700; the newer ones introduced include the ES 5000 and ES 5300; however, none of them are available for end-to-end virtualisation – EVA is the only one (I mean here that none of the arrays can be virtualised fully). In fact, if you compare our product with EMC’s offering, we actually provide virtualisation at the lowest level while they simply provide it as an add-on.

As it happens with every piece of technology, when it is introduced it is expensive, but as time moves on the technology simplifies and becomes affordable. So when EVA was introduced it was positioned as a top-end storage solution and was expensive; however, now it is into the mid-range level. For example, EVA 4400 that we introduced about a year ago is a low-range storage solution, which brings enterprise-level features at SMB pricing. Also EVA 6400 and 8400, which we have introduced recently, run the same firmware as the 4400.

As far as SAN level virtualisation is concerned, yes, we do face competition. IBM already has a product and EMC is about to launch one, but I believe that we do it in a much smarter way as our nearest competitor is largely a software-based company. We have a technology called SplitPass in which 97 percent of the data flow goes into specially-designed hardware called the DataPass module and the remaining 3 percent goes into software, which needs to be processed by a server. So in most of our internal testing, we haven’t seen SVSP suffering any latency in the storage space.

How do EVA solutions help save IT costs especially in tough economic conditions?

The economic situation is nothing new for us per se, as we have been stressing on total cost of ownership, low operating costs, ease of use etc for many years now. We make the illustration very easy and even a high school student can do it; so for customers, they will easily find people to manage it. If you look at it that way, the cost to train the system administrator is relatively very high.

However, as our storage solutions are so intuitive and easy to operate, anyone possessing basic knowledge of storage can operate them, thereby saving the training costs. Also, as it is virtualised, it improves the utilisation rate of capacity; so for the same amount invested you can use more. In the industry, you can easily find an array utilisation rate of 30 percent, but on EVA you can easily get past 50 percent. Virtualisation also reduces the need of having more physical capacity, thus power and cost savings occur.

By using Dynamic Capacity Management, we can further improve the utilisation of storage because the user can dynamically expand the capacity allocated to one data centre while shrinking the other’s size. This process is automatic and reduces the total disc capacity our client needs, which in turn reduces power consumption.

The latest generation of HP EVAs also possess high capacity as far as density is concerned. A 2 meter rack possesses up to 216 TB of memory, which saves space.

What about maintenance costs?

EVAs are pretty easy to maintain. In the traditional array storage solutions, there is a limitation to the minimum number of discs you need to have, which typically is four. EVA doesn’t have any such limitation; also it automatically restores data eliminating the need for any human involvement.

There are certain industry standards which have to be followed, like the standard disc (lowest) size can’t be less than 146GB. Disc sizes smaller than this have already been phased out by leading manufacturers like Seagate, Hitachi etc. So if a client wants just about 50GB of additional space, he often ends up buying 146GB, which is good as far as increase in capacity is concerned but the utilisation remains dormant. However, as I said, EVAs have no such limitation and therefore help in saving costs.

What do you think would be the key factors, which would drive growth in the EVA space?

Whatever be the economic situation, I think growth wouldn’t be stopped even if it slows down. So I think consolidation of storage infrastructure, and to some extent even servers would be a driver in this space.

The second driver would be virtualisation. After you have consolidated your infrastructure, you need a solution where you can dynamically allocate space for each function.

The third driver, in my opinion, would be automation, specifically operational automation, as network costs are rising and as long as you can automate it, the total cost of ownership can be contained.