DataDirect Networks collaborates with Intel

In a single 45 unit rack, the new EXAScaler today delivers over 4.8 PB of usable storage using 6TB disk drives, 100MB/sec sustained scalable per-drive performance, up to 40GB/sec sustained throughput and up to 1.5 million IOPS.

The latest version of the EXAScaler appliance offers the world’s highest sustained Lustre metadata performance, capable of exceeding 100,000 file creates per second, even when creating millions of files under intensive load.

To meet the large-scale storage and analytics needs of Enterprise and HPC environments today, users require the mixed I/O performance and concurrent client access of a parallel file system in combination with high performance storage, backed by 24x7 enterprise-grade support.

The ability to scale to tens of thousands of clients and petabytes of storage with DDN’s highly optimized Lustre v2.5 client and support for dual-rail infiniband makes the EXAScaler appliance, in particular, attractive to both academic and scientific research organizations, as well as enterprises that are scaling at HPC levels such as those in oil and gas, financial services and manufacturing industries.

DDN’s Lustre expertise and decade-long support for the world’s largest file storage systems, coupled with the company’s long-standing relationship with Intel, makes DDN the de-facto standard for Lustre-based environments.

Powered by Intel® Enterprise Edition for Lustre* software (Intel® EE for Lustre software), DDN EXAScaler integrates file system and storage media into one extremely high performance file storage appliance to provide massive throughput and highly parallel access that traditional enterprise SAN and NAS storage technologies lack today. Designed specifically for businesses with large scale, high-bandwidth storage needs, the EXAScaler appliance allows users to tap into the power and scalability of Lustre, but with simplified installation, configuration and monitoring features to slash Lustre deployment time from weeks to hours – even for Petascale systems.

Built on DDN’s unique Storage Fusion Architecture (SFA), EXAScaler includes a number of enhancements to help customers simplify the deployment of high performance, high availability configurations including improved drive rebuild times, self-encrypting drive (SED) support, online drive firmware features, and enhanced remote diagnostics tools that provide world-class reliability, availability and serviceability.

Seamless integration and interoperability with DDN’s flagship SFA12KX and SFA7700X high-performance storage solutions, makes EXAScaler the optimal solution for customers looking for the HPC performance of parallel file systems without the management overhead and complexity of building their own. The EXAScaler appliance is easily managed with the DirectMon Management GUI that offers centralized configuration, monitoring and management functionality across the entire DDN product portfolio.

New EXAScaler Appliance Powered by Intel Offers Unprecedented Performance and Reliability, Integration of Lustre with Apache Hadoop, and 24x7 Support from DDN

The latest version of EXAScaler integrates DDN high-performance SFA storage appliances with a new custom-optimized version of the Lustre file system, based on the Intel EE for Lustre software, and incorporating new enhancements to Lustre stability, reliability, and performance.

The EXAScaler appliance provides large-scale MPI users with significant performance enhancements including fully parallel I/O throughput across thousands of clients, servers, and storage devices. Additionally, EXAScaler significantly improves single client throughput as well as metadata and small file I/O performance, to accelerate time-to-insight in data analytics environments, such as life sciences, energy exploration and image analysis.

Offering full integration with industry leading distributions of Hadoop software from Apache Software Foundation and Cloudera, DDN’s EXAScaler uses a unique adapter which allows users to run MapReduce applications directly on top of Lustre software. This allows the EXAScaler appliance to accelerate the rate which data can be accessed and analyzed, optimizing the performance of MapReduce operations and delivering faster, more scalable, and easier-to-manage storage.

Rigorous testing by the open source Lustre community and by DDN’s EXAScaler product development teams also provides customers the confidence of a stable software platform that has been proven across diverse industries.
Optimized to Accelerate File Systems, Delivering Massive Performance at Low TCO

With the new EXAScaler appliance, customers can choose between turnkey or customized storage solutions that meet the needs for radically simplified Lustre file system management and performance acceleration within enterprise Big Data environments.

While parallel file systems are a natural fit for streaming and large file access, typically they prove less effective with small file performance. To address this gap, DDN combines EXAScaler with Storage Fusion Xcelerator™ (SFX) flash caching technology to dramatically improve small IO read operations from large data files, as well as small file read throughput.