#119 – Storage Hardware is Back!

#119 – Storage Hardware is Back!

Chris EvansStorage Hardware, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week, Chris and Martin catch up with some of the storage hardware on show at Flash Memory Summit 2019. FMS is essentially a trade show and so there are lots of technologies on display that haven’t quite made it to the enterprise. Technology vendors are selling to other vendors and this year there were some interesting hardware solutions to see. Flash has been on the agenda for the last decade and continues to push the boundaries of capacity and performance. Chris and Martin discuss 96+ layer products and the promise of 500 layers in …

#117 – Introduction to Computational Storage with NGD Systems

#117 – Introduction to Computational Storage with NGD Systems

Chris EvansGuest Speakers, Storage Hardware, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week’s episode is the final recording from Flash Memory Summit 2019. Chris is joined by the team from NGD Systems for a discussion on Computational Storage. On this podcast are Scott Shadley, VP of Marketing, Nader Salessi, CEO and Ashok Savdharia who has the lovely title of “technologist”. Computational storage uses the processing power of modern SSD controllers to run application workloads directly on the SSD itself. Imagine each drive being a mini blade server, with compute, memory and storage. In the case of NGD Systems, this means a range of devices and form …

#116 – Fixing Gaps in Cloud Storage with Andy Watson

#116 – Fixing Gaps in Cloud Storage with Andy Watson

Chris EvansCloud, Guest Speakers, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week, Chris chats with Andy Watson, CTO at WekaIO in another episode recorded live at Flash Memory Summit 2019. With the recent acquisition of E8 Storage and Elastifile by hyper-scale cloud companies, is this move an attempt to plug the gap in existing cloud storage offerings? Andy provides his opinion on the two acquisitions and how they might fit into the existing ecosystem. Even 1GB/s may not be enough throughput as we see more focus on ML/AI applications and using cloud-based GPUs and TPUs. Some applications expect data in both NFS and SMB format. …

#114 – CIO Storage & Data Challenges with Clay Ryder

#114 – CIO Storage & Data Challenges with Clay Ryder

Chris EvansData Management, Guest Speakers, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week, Chris catches up with Clay Ryder from the DCS (Data Centre Systems) group at Western Digital. The discussion focuses on the challenges for today’s CIO, with an emphasis on storage and data. The division of responsibility between CTO and CIO isn’t always obvious. As we learn in this discussion, there’s a lot of overlap and a lot of interaction between the two. CIOs are focused on data and more specifically information, whereas the CTO has to deliver the right platform to meet application needs. The conversation covers challenges around technical debt, determining what …

#106 – Introduction to VAST Data (Part II) with Howard Marks (Sponsored)

#106 – Introduction to VAST Data (Part II) with Howard Marks (Sponsored)

Chris EvansAll-Flash, Guest Speakers, Sponsored, Storage Unpacked Podcast

In this second episode on VAST Data, Chris and Martin continue the discussion with Howard Marks.  You can find the previous episode at #105 – Introduction to VAST Data (Part I).  This time, the conversation continues where the discussion left off, with Howard finishing the explanation of wide striping. To explain exactly how data is accessed on the platform, Howard introduces the concept of v-trees.  These are like b-trees but flatter and wider.  The v-tree is used to hold both metadata and data.  One interesting aspect of the discussion is in understanding exactly how Optane …

#105 – Introduction to VAST Data (Part I) with Howard Marks (Sponsored)

#105 – Introduction to VAST Data (Part I) with Howard Marks (Sponsored)

Chris EvansAll-Flash, Guest Speakers, Sponsored, Storage Hardware, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week, Chris and Martin talk to Howard Marks, Chief Storyteller at VAST Data.  You may know Howard as an independent analyst and author for a range of online publications.  Howard recently joined VAST to help explain and promote understanding of their data platform architecture. The VAST Data platform uses three main technologies that have only recently emerged onto the market.  QLC NAND flash provides long-term, cheap and fast permanent storage.  3D-XPoint (branded as Intel Optane) is used to store metadata and new data before it is committed to flash.  NVMe over Fabrics provides the …

#96 – Discussing SmartNICs and Storage with Rob Davis from Mellanox

#96 – Discussing SmartNICs and Storage with Rob Davis from Mellanox

Chris EvansGuest Speakers, SmartNICs, Storage Unpacked Podcast

In this podcast, recorded live at Dell Technologies World 2019, Chris talks to Rob Davis, VP of Storage Technology at Mellanox, about the development of SmartNIC technology and storage.  SmartNICs offload tasks such as encryption, compression and protocol traffic from core CPUs.  This allows system vendors to create more efficient and cheaper products.  It can also provide a backward compatibility for legacy applications and operating systems. Rob takes us through the implementation of SmartNICs on both the initiator (host) and target (array) side of the storage network.  We discuss vendors using the technology and what …

#87 – The Risks of Storage Media Reuse versus Recycling

#87 – The Risks of Storage Media Reuse versus Recycling

Chris EvansGuest Speakers, Storage Hardware, Storage Unpacked Podcast

In this episode, Chris and Martin talk to Simon Zola from Avtel Data Destruction.  This is a follow-up episode to #85 (Storage for Home and Homelabs) where Martin and Chris questioned the ease of recovering data from pre-owned storage media.  As we find out, the process was pretty easy.  Martin was able to recover significant amounts of personal data with little effort and using standard tools. Media destruction is one route to safely dispose of drives and guarantees that data is destroyed.  But what are the consequences?  Simply disabling a drive and throwing it into …

#84 – Discussing New NVMe Form Factors with Jonathan Hinkle

#84 – Discussing New NVMe Form Factors with Jonathan Hinkle

Chris EvansGuest Speakers, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This week, Chris and Martin talk to Jonathan Hinkle, Principal Researcher – System Architecture and Master Inventor at Lenovo.  As solid-state storage and NVMe become more prevalent, the legacy 2.5″ HDD format is increasingly impractical for getting the best density, power and cooling in servers.  Jonathan explains how his work led to the founding of the Enterprise and Data Centre Small Form Factor working group and new device formats being introduced into the industry. EDSFF is responsible for managing device standards like Intel Ruler (see a previous blog episode covering this technology).  How did the …

#61 – Introduction to NVM Express with Amber Huffman

#61 – Introduction to NVM Express with Amber Huffman

Chris EvansGuest Speakers, NVMe, Standards, Storage Unpacked Podcast

This is the second of a series of podcasts recorded at Flash Memory Summit 2018 in Santa Clara.  In this episode, Chris talks to Amber Huffman, Intel Fellow and President and founder of NVM Express Inc.  NVM Express is the standards body that governs the development of the NVMe base standard, NVMe-MI (Management Interface) and NVMe over Fabrics.  Amber explains how standards’ bodies are initially established, including the ongoing ownership of intellectual property.  The discussion continues, looking at how NVM Express standards are developed by committee, how the body is funded and how the process …