PowerMax 2500/8500

Today we announced a new set of platforms, the PowerMax 2500 & 8500. For ease of reference and to avoid confusion, I'll refer to this as the V4 platform to distinguish it from the previous PowerMax which I'll call the V3. The boxes run a new operating system, PowerMax OS 10. This OS is unique...

NVMe/TCP and SRDF (with VMware)

I'm not sure this topic requires a full post, but if you don't work with NVMeoF technology much, you may assume that it is just a different way to connect to your storage and everything else functions pretty much the same as it does with FC/iSCSI connectivity. Spoiler - it doesn't. Here I am interested...

PowerMax File Replication Failover

Sorry for the delay from the previous PowerMax File Replication post, but I had lots of other tasks related to the release I had to complete so I just had a chance to get back to File. I wanted to complete our discussion by showing both planned and unplanned failover. We'll take it from the...

VSI 9.1

I had a request to do an updated post on Virtual Storage Integrator or VSI. The last post I did was on version 8.6 which had some new features for the PowerMax array. And although the current version 9.1 released in January does not have new features for PowerMax, the interface has changed a bit...

Reprotect SRDF before reprotect SRM

I have worked with a number of companies that have a DR requirement that their production environment switch sites (for the sake of this post we are speaking of a traditional two site configuration) every six months. Think of this as taking the place of regular testing at the DR site. Really then these companies...

NVMe/TCP on the PowerMax

With our new platform we've introduced another NVMeoF solution - NVMe/TCP. We will not be supporting FC-NVMe on the PowerMax 2500/8500 in the GA release, however, I'd guess it will come in the future. The reason for the focus is simple, the future is in TCP. IDC is projecting that TCP will have the majority...

SRDF SRA 10.0

Along with the new PowerMax as expected we have a new SRA release, version 10.0. The primary feature of the release is to support Solutions Enabler 10.0 and the new platform - PowerMax 2500/8500. But there are a few items to discuss concerning the release, one a new requirement, the second a bug fix which...

File on PowerMax 2500/8500

File The new PowerMax has upgraded its NAS capabilities from the previous eNAS implementation and is now called PowerMax File. Because there is new hardware with this release, if you are running eNAS on a PowerMax 2000 or 8000, PowerMax File will be a new implementation. There will be a number of ways to bring...

Dell PowerMax Content Pack v1.4 for VMware Log Insight

I've posted the newest build of the content pack for the PowerMax array in conjunction with the announcement of our newest platform - the PowerMax 2500 and 8500. In alignment with the new naming I spoke about in my GA blog post, the content pack will now be named the Dell PowerMax Content Pack (DPCP)....

PowerMax File Replication

Continuing from my last post on PowerMax File, I'm going to cover how to replicate an NFS filesystem from one PowerMax to another. Replication So let’s move now to protect our FS by setting up replication. There is also the option to use snapshots for protection, but I'm going to cover the new replication capability...