Pure Storage FlashArray//C

Purity for FlashArray delivers rich, enterprise-level data services; DirectFlash global flash management; and Evergreen improvements with every release. Features such as ActiveCluster™ for business continuity, ActiveDR™ for disaster recovery, QoS, VMware Virtual Volumes (vVols), NVMe-oF, Snap to NFS, Purity CloudSnap™, and SafeMode™ are all examples of new features provided over time with non-disruptive, no-additional-cost Purity upgrades. All Purity storage services, APIs, and advanced data services are built-in and included with every array.

• Data reduction: Purity averages an industry-leading 5:1 data reduction with a total efficiency of 10:1 (including thin provisioning).
• Always-on encryption: Purity’s “encrypt everything” approach provides built-in enterprise-grade data security without user intervention or key management.
• High availability: Purity protects against concurrent dual-drive failures and initiates re-builds automatically within minutes. Purity also treats performance variability as a failure and uses parity to work around bottlenecks to deliver consistent latency.
• Unified storage with file services: If you run NAS-based apps in addition to SAN-based enterprise databases, Purity’s consolidated SAN and NAS capabilities let you avoid the trouble and expense of running two incompatible environments.
• Always-on ransomware remediation: Cost-efficient, portable, SafeMode snapshots prevent cyber attackers from tampering with or maliciously destroying critical recovery data.
• Intelligent quality of service (QoS): Purity continuously tunes infrastructure using always-on QoS to prevent workloads from hogging resources and to ensure maximum utilization of the array.
• Faster, more consistent performance: Pure DirectFlash Fabric gives you maximum throughput with microsecond latency that’s far more predictable than with conventional SSDs.
• On-demand data portability: Quickly and easily move data where they most cost-effectively meet service level agreements to satisfy your customers: between both physical and virtual machines, between on-premises and the cloud.

FlashArray is specifically architected for innovators, moving beyond the legacy SSD architectures that have flash pretending to be a hard disk. Instead, DirectFlash speaks directly to raw NAND with a super-efficient NVMe protocol and leverages NVMe-oF. DirectFlash includes multiple components:

DirectFlash software (DFS): DirectFlash software manages array I/O globally, for a faster, more efficient architecture. It provides detailed I/O scheduling and performance management. This makes I/Os deterministic and reducing average latency by reducing the number of slow I/Os that would often occur in SSD architectures.

DirectFlash Module (DFM): DFM is a Pure-designed flash module that connects raw flash directly to the FlashArray storage via NVMe. Unlike traditional SSDs that use a flash controller or flash translation layer, DFM is just raw flash. This design removes performance roadblocks of SSDs used by many legacy storage architectures.

DirectFlash Shelf: DirectFlash Shelf is used to add additional NVMe capacity to a FlashArray//C and is external to the array chassis. Instead, it’s connected to the chassis via NVMe-oF protocol with RDMA over converged (RoCE), leveraging 50GB-per-second Ethernet. The shelf maintains the ability to support different sizes of DFMs as flash density improves and new forms become available, such as SCM, QLC, and others. 

DirectFlash Fabric: DirectFlash Fabric lowers network latency dramatically and enables enterprise-class reliability and data services via shared storage versus DAS. NVMe-oF enables massive optimization between the storage controllers and host over fast networking: FibreChannel, RoCE, and TCP. DirectFlash Fabric delivers greater performance and efficiency gains, including offloading the host CPU.

With Evergreen Storage, you can deploy once and enjoy a subscription to continuous innovation as you expand and improve performance, capacity, density, and/or features for 10 years or more—all without downtime, performance impact, or data migrations. Pure has engineered compatibility for future technologies directly into the product via the modular, stateless architecture of FlashArray. This means you can upgrade non-disruptively and expand the equipment you already own. Evergreen programs like Ever Modern and Ever Agile provide full trade-in value when upgrading controllers, giving you the agility you need to grow and modernize. 

The Capacity Consolidation program keeps your storage dense as you expand, without becoming obsolete. With Evergreen Storage, you don’t have to re-buy terabytes you already own. Keep your storage simple, evergreen, and dense—and always meet your business needs. Pure uniquely offers all of our core solutions either as products (CAPEX) or as services (OPEX) via Evergreen//One™.