Note: Evaluator Group research of Storage Virtualization has been discontinued. The following Product Brief has been archived and is no longer being maintained for updates as of January 2023.
The Dell EMC VPLEX is a network-based, virtualized storage product designed to create high-availability storage between datacenters and to provide the ability to move applications and data between storage environments. VPLEX leverages Dell EMC’s common hardware design employed in the Unity, VNX, and PowerMax/VMAX. The hardware has the identical form factor, with input / output (I/O) connection differences from the other products. The embedded software (firmware) running on VPLEX is known as GeoSynchrony.
The VPLEX system has design aspects similar to a shared disk cluster in that each VPLEX controller has access to all data within the system. In this respect, VPLEX aggregates multiple physically distributed caches into one logical cache, through a high-speed interconnect and a cache-mapping table. However, each node is assigned ownership of a data space, or logical unit number (LUN), which makes a VPLEX most similar to a federated cluster.
Dell EMC accomplishes distributed cache coherence using techniques that compensate for latency and bandwidth issues that can cause problems when physical distance separates federated nodes. There are two type of nodes, the VS2 and VS6. The VS6 is targeted at supporting all-flash storage systems.
A Virtual Edition can be used as a vAPP for low-cost deployments that will work with cloud service providers. MetroPoint is a three-site solution for business continuity (BC) between two sites and a third site copy for disaster recovery (DR).
VPLEX integrates with CloudArray, the cloud gateway platform from Dell EMC’s acquisition of TwinStrata, to tier data to cloud storage providers. Support cloud locations include Amazon S3, VMware vCloud Air, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform.
Dell EMC VPLEX Product Brief Includes:Â
- Overview
- Usage
- Highlights
- EvaluScale Product Review Methodology
- Evaluator Group Opinion
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