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How to analyze the difference between NVMe AFA and Pure Storage in Kaminario? I believe many inexperienced people don't know what to do about it. Therefore, this paper summarizes the causes and solutions of the problem. Through this article, I hope you can solve this problem.

Recently, Kamanario released its NVMe AFA, called K2.N. This is a 100% NVMe all-flash array, that is, both its front end and back end support NVMe/F.

I shared Pure Storage's NVMe/F array with you in front-end time (see the biggest update in the history of Pure Storage, double active and NVMe/F extension box are the biggest highlights). Today we'll take a look at how Kaminario's thinking is different.

Let's first take a look at the architecture of K2.N. K2.N divides AFA into two types of nodes, c.node is the control node, which is equivalent to the controller of our current array, and m.node is the media node, which is equivalent to the hard drive frame of our current array.

However, because c.node and m.node are both NMVe/F connections, they both connect in the same way. Kaminario chose 25/50GbE RoCE technology, which is exactly the same as Pure Storage. However, we see that Kaminario is smart, and its front end retains the support of traditional FC and iSCSI. That is, this NVMe AFA supports hybrid networking.

Kaminario still uses the way of SDS, although its AFA does not sell software alone, but the hardware it uses is commercial hardware on the market, that is, it has not developed any hardware, and all its research and development is on the software. Let's take a look at Kaminario's choice of hardware. If you design a product, you can also refer to it.

First, we see that its m.node uses AIC's HA202I-PH two-node server. In other words, in the NVMe era, m.node is not as simple as a disk box, its architecture is actually almost the same as dual-control storage. Each m.node can be plugged into 24 NVMe SSD.

Second, c.node uses Supermicro's X11 server storage platform. The exact model is unknown, but it should also be a two-node model.

All nodes are equipped with Broadcom's NetXtreme RoCE network card to provide 25/50GbE connection.

As for 25/50GbE 's RoCE switch, it is Mellanox's product.

In order to protect FC's investment, its front-end NMVe/F also supports NMVe/F over FC. This part chooses the Brocade solution.

We can see that Kaminario did not develop its own hardware, all using commercial hardware to solve the problem.

The software continues to use the VisionOS used by K2, so that its function can be consistent with that of K2.

However, due to the characteristics of NVMe/F, c.node and m.node can be combined arbitrarily without rewiring, so Kaminario introduces the Flex feature to support VPA (Virtual Private Array). That is, these VPA can be created in turbulence and adjusted dynamically.

This feature is amazing, and Pure Storage doesn't even plan for this feature (mainly because Pure doesn't support scale-out). If you look at the figure below, a physical AFA is divided into five VPA (logical AFA) to use. This is a very useful feature in the age of clouds.

When we compare the design of Kaminario and Pure for NVMe/F all-flash array, we can see the difference between the two vendors' ideas.

First of all, in the same part, everyone chose 25G/50G 's RoCE network technology to run NVMe, but did not choose the IB technology used in the original node interconnection. That is, NVMe over IB doesn't seem to be going mainstream. It's just that Kaminario is the front-end NVMe support, retaining the FC. This view is similar to mine, that is, NVMe over FC must be supported by some users who have already invested in FC, because their investment is protected. Pure is not clear whether it supports NVMe over FC.

Apart from the same point, many other ideas are different.

1. Kaminario uses a software-defined way and does not develop any hardware; but the idea of Pure is better. On the contrary, its control node, disk frame node, including NVMe module are all developed by themselves.

2. Kaminario supports scale-out, so the VPA feature can be further supported. Pure is still two controllers, let alone support the VPA feature.

We see that there are more and more all-flash arrays supporting 100% NVMe/F in the market, and there are many startups such as E8, Mangstor, and Excelero. However, the architecture of these startups lacks the layer of c.node, which is more like a shared DAS, with few advanced value-added features such as snapshots and replication.

After reading the above, have you mastered the different methods of analyzing Kaminario's NVMe AFA and Pure Storage? If you want to learn more skills or want to know more about it, you are welcome to follow the industry information channel, thank you for reading!

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