Adaptec Hybrid RAID

ADAPTEC HYBRID RAID SOLUTIONS Maximum Performance and Reliability

THE DATA CENTER CHALLENGE

As applications become more robust and user demand for speed grows, data centers battle to increase infrastructure performance

  Growth in the number of end-users compounds the problem by cause longer response times and increasing latency

  According to Equation Research1 : –  78% of site visitors have gone to a competitor’s site due to poor performance during peak times –  88% are less likely to return to a site after a poor user experience –  47% left with a less positive perception of the company

1 “When more Website visitors hurt your business: Are you ready for peak traffic?,” Equation Research 2010

2 READ MORE! Go to www.adaptec.com/hybrid-raid

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POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS

  Add very fast hard disk drives (HDDs) — for example 15,000 RPM Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) drives

  “Short stroke” the HDDs (use only the outermost tracks on the disks where the performance is best)

  Add new servers, even if the existing servers have the storage capacity for more users

These solutions, however, increase power, cooling, and maintenance, costs and physical space requirements.

Solid State Drives (SSDs) alleviate many of these problems.



SOLID STATE DRIVES (SSDS): PERFORMANCE IN A FLASH

SSD Advantages vs. HDD

  Higher read bandwidth

  Higher IOPS

  Better mechanical reliability

  Higher resistance to shock and vibrations

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SSD Disadvantages vs. HDD

  Limited capacity

  Lower streaming write bandwidth

  Each destination data block must be erased before new data can be written, causing uneven surface wear and premature drive failure

  Much more expensive than HDDs, especially when measured using the traditional “cost per GB of capacity” metric

READ MORE! Go to www.adaptec.com/hybrid-raid Follow us on twitter @Adaptec_by_PMC

HYBRID RAID

Hybrid RAID is a redundant storage solution that combines high capacity, low-cost SATA or higher-performance SAS HDDs with low latency, high IOPS SSDs and an SSD-aware RAID adapter card.



HYBRID RAID BENEFITS

  It is usually impractical to replace every HDD with an SSD

  Hybrid RAID is extremely cost efficient, especially when measured in terms of the “cost per I/O operation” or the more Green-oriented “power consumption per I/O operation”

  Hybrid RAID offers tremendous performance gains over standard HDD-only RAID arrays



BUILDING A HYBRID SOLUTION

Hardware

  Any capacity SSDs and HDDs can be used in equal numbers

  If different-sized drives are used, the drive segment size is the size of the smaller disk drive

  A RAID 1 created with one 128GB SSD and one 2TB HDD will make a 128GB logical device

  A RAID 10 created with two 128GB SSDs and two 2TB HDDs will make a 256GB logical device

  The remaining HDD capacity can be used for storage

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Applications

  Pairing Hybrid RAID with applications is more difficult since most software was not created to be aware of the possibility of having two types of storage with such different characteristics

  In order to take full advantage of a Hybrid RAID setup, an SSD-aware RAID adapter with intelligent storage processing must be deployed

REAL-WORLD HYBRID RAID SCENARIOS

LARGE-CAPACITY SERVERS, TRADITIONAL HDD-ONLY METHOD

  Scenario:

  Customer wants to maximize the use of space in an 8-bay server while still gaining a fast-booting server

  Customer wants to keep OS away from data (OS in mirror and data in RAID 5 for maximum capacity)

  Disadvantages:

  Two bays in the server are wasted on the OS boot drives; capacity is limited to six drives in RAID 5

  Server is booting from standard HHD in mirror, which is not a particularly fast form of RAID



LARGE-CAPACITY SERVERS, HYBRID RAID SOLUTION

  Advantages

  Total server capacity is six times the usable capacity of each drive in a RAID 5

  The server boots from the faster SSD

  Unused disk space on each disk can be utilized in another array if required

  A 500GB RAID 5 disk could be created across the six unused disk segments



WORKSTATION, HYBRID RAID SOLUTION

  Scenario:

  User wants a fast-booting, fast application-loading system without needing to rebuild the workstation if a drive fails

  Hybrid solution advantages:

  All reads are directed from the SSD

  Write speed is the same as a standard workstation but, due to the cache on the adapter card, is faster than a standard HDD

  When a failed drive is replaced, the array will rebuild onto the replacement drive with no data loss

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Note: It is not recommended to use the unused 200GB capacity on the 500GB HDD due to the fact that this data is not redundant, and failure of the HDD would result in data loss.


SMALL BUSINESS, HYBRID RAID SOLUTION

READ MORE!

For specific data on Small Business solutions, go to: www.adaptec.com/hybrid-raid

Download the Hybrid RAID Solutions White Paper

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ADAPTEC HYBRID RAID SOLUTIONS

ADAPTEC HYBRID RAID

  Hybrid RAID can be leveraged simply by installing updated firmware onto any Adaptec Series 7, Series 6, or Series Q SAS/SATA RAID adapter

  The adapter automatically creates a Hybrid RAID array whenever one or more SSDs are combined with the same number of HDDs in a RAID 1 or RAID 10 array

  The Hybrid RAID is completely transparent to the operating system and all running applications

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ASR-72405 24-Port ASR-71605 16-Port

Adaptec RAID 6805 – 8 internal ports Adaptec RAID 6445 – 8 ports (4 int / 4 ext)

Adaptec RAID 6405 – 4 internal ports


ADAPTEC HYBRID RAID VS. COMPETITION

  Adaptec RAID adapters deliver maximum Hybrid array performance by writing to both HDD and SSD, and reading from SSD 100% of the time (Top Figure)

  By contrast, other adapters write and read from HDD and SSD (Bottom Figure). Since server I/O of an SSD can be up to 100 times faster than HDD, competitive Hybrid RAID solutions typically deliver lower I/O performance

15 READ MORE! Go to www.adaptec.com/hybrid-raid Follow us on twitter @Adaptec_by_PMC

ADAPTEC HYBRID RAID PERFORMANCE

  Adaptec Hybrid RAID arrays deliver a higher number of read operations per second than standard HDD arrays with no degradation of write I/O performance


ADAPTEC HYBRID RAID PERFORMANCE

  Some applications even see a slight performance benefit from Adaptec Hybrid RAID and are faster on a Hybrid RAID 1 than on a single SSD.

  As such, Adaptec Hybrid RAID offers better performance and lower cost/GB, and lower cost and power consumption per I/O than competing Hybrid RAID solutions.


INTEROPERABILITY AND COMPATIBILITY WORKING WITH OUR PARTNERS

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  Adaptec by PMC engages with over 25 ecosystem partners   Tested with over 300 disk drives, systems, entry-level storage devices, and

other devices   Ongoing effort – will test new devices when available

  Seamless integration into any server design   Less hassle for system integrators


CONCLUSION

  Hybrid RAID arrays of SSDs and HDDs offer significantly better performance than standard HDD RAID arrays at a lower cost than SSD-only arrays

  Adaptec Series 7, Series 6, and Series Q RAID adapters can create a seamless Hybrid RAID array whenever one or more SSDs are combined with the same number of HDDs in a RAID 1 or RAID 10 array

  Adaptec Hybrid RAID delivers maximum system performance by reading only from the SSD


Adaptec Hybrid RAID

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