Ibm Ds8000 High Performance Flash Enclosure

This IBM® RedpaperTM publication describes the IBM DS8880 High-Performance Enclosure (HPFE) Gen2 architecture and configuration, as of DS8900 Release 9.1. The IBM® DS8000® High-Performance Flash Enclosure Gen2 (HPFE Gen2) is a 2U storage enclosure that is installed in pairs in DS8900F and DS8880 models. The flash enclosure and Flash RAID adapters are installed in pairs. Each storage enclosure pair can support 16, 32, or 48 encryption-capable flash drives (2.5-inch, 63.5 mm form factor).

The high-performance flash enclosure (HPFE) is available for the IBM DS8870 and DS8880 models and offers integration and optimization of flash technology for mission-critical performance. The HPFE is a Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID) storage enclosure that can support sixteen or thirty 400 GB encryption capable flash cards (1.8-inch, 46 mm form factor) in a 1U rack space. This IBM® Redbooks® Product Guide describes the IBM DS8000® high-performance flash enclosure. HPFEs can be installed in the IBM DS8870 and IBM DS8880 storage systems.

This IBM® RedpaperTM publication describes the IBM DS8880 High-Performance Enclosure (HPFE) Gen2 architecture and configuration, as of DS8900 Release 9.0. The IBM® DS8000® High-Performance Flash Enclosure Gen2 (HPFE Gen2) is a 2U storage enclosure that is installed in pairs in DS8900F and DS8880 models.. The flash enclosure and Flash RAID adapters are installed in pairs. Each storage enclosure pair can support 16, 32, or 48 encryption-capable flash drives (2.5-inch, 63.5 mm form factor).

This IBM® RedpaperTM publication describes the concepts and functions of IBM System Storage® Easy Tier®, and explains its practical use with the IBM DS8000® series and License Machine Code 7.9.0.xxx (also known as R9.0).. Easy Tier is designed to automate data placement throughout the storage system disks pool. It enables the system to (automatically and without disruption to applications) relocate data (at the extent level) across up to three drive tiers. The process is fully automated. Easy Tier also automatically rebalances extents among ranks within the same tier, removing workload skew between ranks, even within homogeneous and single-tier extent pools. Easy Tier supports a Manual Mode that enables you to relocate full volumes. Manual Mode also enables you to merge extent pools and offers a rank depopulation function. Easy Tier fully supports thin-provisioned Extent Space Efficient fixed block (FB) and count key data (CKD) volumes in Manual Mode and Automatic Mode. Easy Tier also supports extent pools with small extents (16 MiB extents for FB pools and 21 cylinders extents for CKD pools). Easy Tier also supports high-performance and high-capacity flash drives in the High-performance flash enclosure, and it enables additional user controls at the pool and volume levels. This paper is aimed at those professionals who want to understand the Easy Tier concept and its underlying design. It also provides guidance and practical illustrations for users who want to use the Easy Tier Manual Mode capabilities. Easy Tier includes additional capabilities to further enhance your storage performance automatically: Easy Tier Application, and Easy Tier Heat Map Transfer.

Updated for R8.51 This IBM® Redbooks® publication describes the concepts, architecture, and implementation of the IBM DS8880 family. The book provides reference information to assist readers who need to plan for, install, and configure the DS8880 systems. The IBM DS8000® family is a high-performance, high-capacity, highly secure, and resilient series of disk storage systems. The DS8880 family is the latest and most advanced of the DS8000 offerings to date. The high availability, multiplatform support, including IBM Z, and simplified management tools help provide a cost-effective path to an on-demand and cloud-based infrastructures. The IBM DS8880 family now offers business-critical, all-flash, and hybrid data systems that span a wide range of price points: DS8882F: Rack Mounted storage system DS8884: Business Class DS8886: Enterprise Class DS8888: Analytics Class The DS8884 and DS8886 are available as either hybrid models, or can be configured as all-flash. Each model represents the most recent in this series of high-performance, high-capacity, flexible, and resilient storage systems. These systems are intended to address the needs of the most demanding clients. Two powerful IBM POWER8® processor-based servers manage the cache to streamline disk I/O, maximizing performance and throughput. These capabilities are further enhanced with the availability of the second generation of high-performance flash enclosures (HPFEs Gen-2) and newer flash drives. Like its predecessors, the DS8880 supports advanced disaster recovery (DR) solutions, business continuity solutions, and thin provisioning. All disk drives in the DS8880 storage system include the Full Disk Encryption (FDE) feature. The DS8880 can automatically optimize the use of each storage tier, particularly flash drives, by using the IBM Easy Tier® feature. Release 8.5 introduces the Safeguarded Copy feature. The DS8882F Rack Mounted is decribed in a separate publication, Introducing the IBM DS8882F Rack Mounted Storage System, REDP-5505.

This IBM Redbooks® Product Guide gives an overview of the features and functions that are available with the IBM DS8880 models running microcode Release 8.51 (DS8000 License Machine Code 8.8.51.xx.xx). The IBM DS8880 architecture relies on powerful IBM POWER8® processor-based servers that manage the cache to streamline disk input/output (I/O), maximizing performance and throughput. These capabilities are further enhanced with the availability of the second generation of high-performance flash enclosures (HPFE Gen-2). The IBM DS8888, DS8886, and DS8884 models excel at supporting the IBM Z Enterprise server and IBM Power server environments, offering many synergy features.

This IBM® Redbooks® publication provides guidance about how to configure, monitor, and manage your IBM DS8880 storage systems to achieve optimum performance, and it also covers the IBM DS8870 storage system. It describes the DS8880 performance features and characteristics, including hardware-related performance features, synergy items for certain operating systems, and other functions, such as IBM Easy Tier® and the DS8000® I/O Priority Manager. The book also describes specific performance considerations that apply to particular host environments, including database applications. This book also outlines the various tools that are available for monitoring and measuring I/O performance for different server environments, and it describes how to monitor the performance of the entire DS8000 storage system. This book is intended for individuals who want to maximize the performance of their DS8880 and DS8870 storage systems and investigate the planning and monitoring tools that are available. The IBM DS8880 storage system features, as described in this book, are available for the DS8880 model family with R8.0 release bundles (Licensed Machine Code (LMC) level 7.8.0).

This IBM® Redbooks® publication introduces the IBM Software Defined Environment (SDE) solution, which helps to optimize the entire computing infrastructure--compute, storage, and network resources--so that it can adapt to the type of work required. In today's environment, resources are assigned manually to workloads, but that happens automatically in a SDE. In an SDE, workloads are dynamically assigned to IT resources based on application characteristics, best-available resources, and service level policies so that they deliver continuous, dynamic optimization and reconfiguration to address infrastructure issues. Underlying all of this are policy-based compliance checks and updates in a centrally managed environment. Readers get a broad introduction to the new architecture. Think integration, automation, and optimization. Those are enablers of cloud delivery and analytics. SDE can accelerate business success by matching workloads and resources so that you have a responsive, adaptive environment. With the IBM Software Defined Environment, infrastructure is fully programmable to rapidly deploy workloads on optimal resources and to instantly respond to changing business demands. This information is intended for IBM sales representatives, IBM software architects, IBM Systems Technology Group brand specialists, distributors, resellers, and anyone who is developing or implementing SDE.