HPE introduces First Scale-Out Disaggregated Block Storage

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Unveils HPE GreenLake for Block Storage Release 3, Built on HPE Alletra Storage MP, the Pioneer in Scale-Out Disaggregated Block Storage. It Empowers Enterprises to Independently Scale Capacity and Performance. Utilizing a Shared-Everything Storage Architecture and Administered Through the HPE GreenLake Cloud Platform, This Distinctive Block Storage Solution Delivers an On-Premises Cloud Experience, Efficient Scalability, and Exceptional Resilience and Performance for Modern Mission-Critical Workloads.

 “Optimising data management is paramount for today’s modern businesses that give precedence to a data-centric approach,” said Kamal Kashyap, Director, India – Storage Business Unit, Hewlett Packard Enterprise India. “The HPE GreenLake for Block Storage MP Release 3 is a significant leap forward, introducing advanced AI-driven performance reporting and analytics, elevating troubleshooting capabilities, and offering enriched insights. With this release, we strive to not just broaden the scope of HPE GreenLake for Block Storage offerings but also empower our customers to modernize storage management and address the growing requirements of today’s enterprise data management.”

Release 3 introduces new multi-node switch models, doubling the performance and increasing capacity by two-and-a-half times compared to their switchless predecessors. It fully unleashes NVMe's potential for Ethernet networking by supporting NVMe-oF/TCP, alongside existing Fibre Channel, NVMe-oF/FC, and iSCSI connectivity options. Management via the HPE GreenLake cloud platform is enhanced with advanced AI-driven performance reporting and analytics. A new warranty program for quadruple data compression ensures improved cost efficiency. Continuing its tradition, HPE maintains a 100% data availability guarantee with this release.

New Storage Architecture

Traditional storage architectures usually feature two or four high availability (HA) controller nodes, interconnected in pairs. These node pairs are linked to dedicated drives through a midplane within a single hardware enclosure. The midplane often acts as a bottleneck, dictating the system's maximum performance. To enhance performance, enterprises must acquire a new system with an additional pair of HA controller nodes, even if they don't require extra capacity. This approach not only generates "orphan capacity" concerns but also leads to complex silos that are challenging to manage and upkeep.

However, in HPE GreenLake for Block Storage MP Release 3, the midplane is adaptable and offers ample I/O capacity. This flexibility enables enterprises to incorporate extra controllers for enhanced performance, and independently and as required, integrate additional drives and JBOFs to expand application capacity. All storage SSDs are accessible to all controllers via a high-speed network, eradicating silos and mitigating the impact of multiple node failures.

Release 3 introduces switch models with two or four controller nodes, offering a choice between 16- or 32-core configurations. These systems support up to eight JBOF expansion bays, enabling seamless scalability from 15.36 TB to roughly 2.8 PB. Each chassis can accommodate 8 to 24 SSDs, with the option to upgrade drives in increments of 2 and JBOFs in increments of 1.

The parallel, multi-node, all-NVMe architecture features active I/O processing across all media, controllers, and host ports, ensuring consistent, predictable performance, and ultra-low latency.

AIOps management via cloud console

HPE GreenLake for Block Storage, leveraging HPE Alletra Storage MP, provides a cloud-like operational experience driven by cutting-edge AIOps for infrastructure management. This proactive approach reduces reactive troubleshooting by anticipating and averting disruptions in advance. In Release 3, significant enhancements are introduced, particularly in AI-driven performance reporting and analytics. These improvements bolster troubleshooting capabilities and insights, offering trend analysis of headroom utilization, identification of latency hotspots per storage volume, and better recognition of workload drifts and resource contention. Moreover, capacity reports, efficiency metrics, and new sustainability indicators like electricity consumption trends have been incorporated, advancing overall operational visibility and efficiency.

HPE GreenLake for Block Storage MP presents a variety of technologies aimed at data reduction and aggregation. These encompass deduplication with express indexing, a highly efficient compression algorithm, data packing, hardware-accelerated and reservation-free thin provisioning, and virtual copy. These technologies enhance economic efficiency while maintaining performance levels, optimizing flash capacity utilization, and enhancing flash media durability. In Release 3, a 4:1 data aggregation guarantee is introduced, calculated as the ratio between usable and effective capacity across all collapsible data.