TABLE OF CONTENTS
2 UNIFIED STORAGE BENEFITS
3 SOFTWARE DEFINED STORAGE
3 NEXENTASTOR
4 PERFORMANCE
5 SUPERMICRO TOTAL SOLUTIONS FOR
NEXENTA – A UNIFIED STORAGE SOLUTION

WHITE PAPER

UNIFIED STORAGE DEPLOYMENTWITH OPTIMIZED SUPERMICROTOTAL SOLUTIONS FOR NEXENTA
Software Defined Storage Made Easy

6 SUMMARY

Super Micro Computer, Inc.
980 Rock Avenue
San Jose, CA 95131 USA
www.supermicro.com- June 2017

UNIFIED STORAGE BENEFITS
Unified storage is the most common type of storage architecture for midrange systems.
Unified storage combines Storage Area Networks (SAN) for structured data for applications
such as databases and Network Attached Storage (NAS) for unstructured data typically file
based storage.
In a SAN the file system is installed on the compute client, and the data is organized
into blocks which reside on a specialized storage system. These storage systems
typically consist of dual RAID controllers to which a number of disks are attached. The
block protocols are either Fibre channel or iSCSI. SANs are designed for mission-criticalapplications that require low latency and are highly transactional such as relational
databases.
In NAS the compute client does not access its own file system as it does on a SAN, as thefile system resides on a specialized device, the NAS system. Clients address the storage ona file basis. The typical network used is Ethernet and the most common protocols are NFS(Networked File System) and SMB (Server Message Block). NAS systems contain a processor
often referred to as a NAS head, and disk drives typically protected in a RAID arrangement.
In unified storage the features of the NAS head and the RAID controller are combined,
so one storage system can serve the different needs of an organization. Depending on
the protocols used by the applications, unified storage systems can interact with clientson dedicated storage networks or on general local area networks. This brings many
benefits including less time to administer the storage and can facilitate simpler network
deployments. Figure 1 below illustrates a typical deployment in a data center.

Figure 1.

2

Typical deployment in a data center.

Unified Storage Deployment with Optimized Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta

Unified Storage Deployment with Optimized
Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta

In this example the unified storage appliance is serving both SAN and NAS clients withmultiple protocols using a multi-protocol switch. But it could easily serve those clients overtwo separate switches each dedicated to its own protocol, for example a storage switch
running only Fibre Channel or an Ethernet only switch. The protocols selected are typically
based on the performance needs of the application. In this example the database andapplication servers are using FC, while the email server is using iSCSI, and the file services
are being provided using NFS and SMB. Unified storage appliances offer tremendous
flexibility.

SOFTWARE DEFINED STORAGE
A trend that is gaining momentum in recent years has been to implement storage in asoftware defined manner. This is done using industry standard hardware, which allows
for much greater flexibility and cost savings compared to proprietary storage appliances.
Figure 2 below provides a graphical model illustrating the main differences between
traditional proprietary storage and the new software defined model.

Figure 2.

Traditional vs. Software-Defined Storage

While software defined storage offers tremendous savings and flexibility, it also
requires substantial investments in integration, testing, and validation, which can tax anorganization’s resources.

NEXENTASTOR
Nexenta has created a unified storage platform NexentaStor implemented entirely insoftware. It uses the open source OpenZFS file system. It provides full SAN and NAS
functionality, and is scalable to hundreds of Petabytes with an unlimited file system size.
It supports Fibre channel and iSCSI for SAN, and NFS and CIFS/SMB for NAS. NexentaStor
provides a complete set of data management features both in terms of data protectionas well as data reduction. For data protection NexentaStor offers mirroring, RAID Z1(equivalent to RAID5), RAID Z2 (equivalent to RAID6), and RAID Z3 which offers triple parity
data protection allowing a RAID set to survive three disk failures. It also offers snapshots,clones, and high performance asynchronous replication. For data reduction NexentaStor
offers thin provisioning, and inline compression which greatly increases effective storage

White Paper - June 20173

capacity and lowers costs. NexentaStor can be implemented entirely in flash storage, inhybrid configurations, or in all disk configurations.
NexentaStor includes VMware integration with a multi-tenant vCenter Plug-in and VMware
Virtual Volume (VVOL) support, which simplifies capacity, performance, and security
administration tasks. It supports containers with Docker integration, and is integrated
with OpenStack Cinder. NexentaStor is ideal for database and ERP applications such as
Oracle™, Microsoft SQL Server™ and SAP™ as well as Microsoft Exchange; virtual machinesand desktops such as VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V. NexentaStor is also ideal for backup
or disaster recovery use cases.
NexentaStor is easy to deploy and manage with the NexentaFusion GUI and advanced
analytics, as well as the traditional command line interface.

PERFORMANCEA Nexenta appliance powered by Supermicro in an all-flash configuration, was tested andachieved 180,000 8K IOPS in a mixed read/write workload, and sustained bandwidth of 8GB/s.

Figure 3.

4

Benchmark results

Unified Storage Deployment with Optimized Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta

Unified Storage Deployment with Optimized
Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta

SUPERMICRO TOTAL SOLUTIONS FOR NEXENTA – A UNIFIEDSTORAGE SOLUTION
Until now software defined storage required a substantial investment in integration,testing, and validation. Reference architectures exist, but they are advisory in nature, andmuch work needs to be done by an IT organization to deploy such solutions. Supermicro
has partnered with Nexenta to create a line of total storage solutions optimized for
different workloads. These solutions have been integrated, tested, and validated just like a
traditional storage appliance, ready to deploy right out of the box, but at a fraction of thecost. These storage total solutions are available with enterprise support services. Figure 4
below shows the Unified Storage Solutions currently available, and more are expected tobe added in the near future.

Figure 4.

Supermicor Unified Storage Solutions Portfolio
Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta are backed by a comprehensive support programthat includes a single point of contact. Support programs are available for three years
and up to five years. Two options are available: Monday-Friday 9am-5pm with next day
response on-site, or optionally, 7x24 support with four hour on-site response. A Nexenta
remote installation service is also available for HA deployments.

White Paper - June 2017

5

SUMMARY
Storage deployments are transitioning from expensive, closed implementations to morecost effective software defined configurations. This represents aggressive cost savingsof up to 54% compared to traditional solutions, without any vendor lock in. In additioncommodity hardware coupled with Software Defined Storage represents the ability toscale out in a seamless and more granular fashion. However, software defined solutions
require substantial additional efforts in ordering, assembling, integrating, testing, andvalidation, and those costs are substantial, as they require many man-hours that detractfrom productivity. Supermicro’s partnership with Nexenta has resulted in an optimized
and pre-validated Unified Storage solution. Now organizations can take advantage of thissolution and have all the convenience and ease of use and deployment of an appliance,
while enjoying all the cost savings of software defined storage.
For further information relating to Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta, please contact
your Supermicro sales representative.

6Unified Storage Deployment with Optimized Supermicro Total Solutions for Nexenta

About Super Micro Computer, Inc.
Supermicro® (NASDAQ: SMCI), the leading innovator in high-performance, high-efficiency server technology is a premier provider ofadvanced server Building Block Solutions® for Data Center, Cloud Computing, Enterprise IT, Hadoop/Big Data, HPC and Embedded Systems
worldwide. Supermicro is committed to protecting the environment through its “We Keep IT Green®” initiative and provides customers
with the most energy-efficient, environmentally-friendly solutions available on the market.
www.supermicro.com

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