VMAX3 is now Generally Available and represents the next generation of market leading platforms from EMC that have established themselves as the most reliable and highest performing data storage platforms on the planet. Let’s examine what makes VMAX3 the first Data Services Platform in the industry and why VMAX3 is an even more revolutionary step from VMAX, as VMAX was from DMX. Along the way let’s dispel some myths about the product.

At launch VMAX3 is ready for the most mission critical workloads.  At its introduction, the original VMAX was a revolutionary platform, virtualizing the matrix interconnects between internal components and allowing for both scale-up and a scale-out expansion based entirely on Virtual Provisioning.  These were enormous leaps forward in the simplicity and scalability of Symmetrix.  EMC has developed rigorous testing, manufacturing processes, and incredible architecture designs that gave VMAX and then VMAX2 the title of “Most Reliable Symmetrix” ever produced.

VMAX3 is standing on the shoulders of the VMAX2 and is taking Reliability, Availability, and Serviceability to the next level.  Additional redundancy has been added on the backend DA connections to the DAEs.  More upgrades and service events leave the director online.  Tons of serviceability design changes for CS
have been added such as rear facing light bars (ever try to find one of these in a datacenter?), a work tray in the cabinets, etc. that set the VMAX3 as the RAS benchmark in the industry.

A Data Services Platform must be available, but it must also take functionality to the next level.  EMC’s goal for VMAX3 HyperMax OS is to make it the foundational component in our customer’s data center providing access to all of our best capabilities, FAST, SLO, FTS, Cloud, SRDF, TimeFinder, ProtectPoint, etc…).

HyperMax is our most comprehensive OS rewrite to date that takes the massively parallel preemptive multitasking kernel of VMAX3, and opens the door to running other data services apps inside the array.  The VMAX3 Data Services Platform can be extended with additional software functionality online as it comes available.  Most critically to our customers, code upgrades are done without taking a single component offline.  There is no failover/failback, one-at-a-time reboots, ports offline, etc. No other array can do this!

VMAX3 is designed for Always On operations.  Combined with SRDF, VPLEX + RecoverPoint, or ProtectPoint customer operations are always protected from outage, site failure, or any other outage situation.

We talk to our customers about “always on” Platform 3 infrastructure, and now we’ve built VMAX3 into an “always on” Data Services Platform.

Our phased release schedule enables us to get products to market faster.  We tell our customers how Agile development has revolutionized the way apps are brought to market and how the new normal is “fast.”   Get products out fast and iterate fast to
ramp up to provide the most important features first, prioritized by customer demand.  It’s one thing to do this in the Platform 3 web space, because the service is designed to be always on, and upgradable without degradation to the end user experience.  To do this in the hardware market, the platform must provide the same Always On availability to allow upgrades that enable the additional functionality.

In exactly this way, VMAX3 provides us a platform that is always available, and through HyperMax, additional data services can be added later online. Getting the base platform right is critical.   As previously discussed the upgradeability of VMAX3 allows us to introduce this revolutionary product now, which is crucial to maintaining market leadership position and building momentum while simultaneously creating a revolutionary new data services platform.

VMAX3 will carry customers toward Storage as a Service.  Fundamental to the value proposition of VMAX3, like VMAX Cloud Edition before it, is the idea that purchase decisions and provisioning are based on Service Level Objectives as opposed to rotational speed of the drives.  This outcome-based thinking is a wave carrying our customers toward the beachhead of Storage aaS.

Three years ago, EMC’s message for introducing ITaaS Transformation was 1) Have C-level sponsorship, 2) Pick a project and grow it, 3) Let the technology get you there.  Well, VMAX3 is getting our customers there.  Whether or not they have financial models that equate to the service levels inside VMAX3, they gain the simplicity and ability to automate processes that Service Level based provisioning provides.

The VMAX3 Data Services Platform can handle any performance Service Level Objective required by the customer.  Designed as an all-flash capable array, any of the VMAX3 family can support all-flash configurations.  Should the customer chose a higher capacity or lower cost design, spinning disk can be used in combination to provide various SLO’s of performance and capacity within the array.  Front-end and Back-end CPU cores are now pooled giving any port full line rate capability, doubling the IOPs capable on VMAX2.  PCI Gen 3 and 6Gb SAS connections to the DAE’s deliver incredible bandwidth for DSS workloads, tripling the throughput of VMAX2.  VMAX3 provides both the rich data services functionality and the performance required to process the avalanche of new data in the datacenter.

In summary, VMAX3 is an “always-on” scale-up-and-out Data Services Platform that can be online extended via HyperMax OS to provide additional advanced software functionality within the array over its lifespan with incredibly easy to use SLO based provisioning meeting any performance requirements of SAN or NAS attached hosts. This redefinition of the storage array makes VMAX3 a larger step forward from VMAX as VMAX was from DMX.