PowerMax Data Reduction & VMware

Before I discuss data reduction on the PowerMax, I will acknowledge that this can be a confusing topic or process in general. A couple of our field guys, Dan McKenney and Ken Gotsch, get frequent questions in the field as they work with data reduction all the time in VMware, so I offered to write...

PowerMax 2021 Q1 Service Release

This is our Service Release for the GA PowerMaxOS that came out in September 2020. This is our standard practice after a major release so that we can both fix any issues that may have come up (though I should note we do have a recent service pack, too) and to include some new features...

Stranded space on VMAX All Flash datastores – can I get it back?

In a word, yes. Let me start with a basic explanation of VMware storage versus array storage. A VMAX All Flash (AFA) array is a completely thin-provisioned box. A hallmark of using a thin array with VMware invariably means what VMware reports as used storage in a datastore may not reflect what an array reports...

VSI 7.1 eNAS compression/deduplication

VSI 7.1 is now available for download and while not a blockbuster on the VMAX front since we had ours with the 7.0 version, there are a couple minor updates and one new feature. Let's start with the minor changes. The first is that 7.1 adds support for the vSphere 6.5 Web Client. (vSphere 6.5 does...

5977 2016 Q3 SR – Compression, SRDF/Metro et al

Today marks the posting of our Q3 5977 (5977.945.890) release for the VMAX3/VMAX All Flash platforms. Technically most of the host software was available last Friday (e.g. Solutions Enabler 8.3, Unisphere for VMAX 8.3) but the HYPERMAX OS was made available today. The feature that has received and will receive the most attention is compression on VMAX All...