Lab Validation:
SanDisk FlashSoft
3
© 2012 by The Enterprise Strategy Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Introduction
This report documents the results of ESG Lab testing of
SanDisk
FlashSoft for VMware vSphere software. Testing
focused on application performance, virtual machine (VM) density scalability, and ease of integration into a
VMware environment.
Background
Organizations are increasingly deploying solid-state drives (SSD) in their data centers. Recent ESG research
uncovered what benefits SSD users are experiencing as well as what benefits potential users hope to achieve. As
Figure 1 shows, improving application performance is at the top of both lists, followed by reducing power
consumption, improving resource utilization, and reducing operational expenses.
1
Figure 1. Benefits of Solid-state Storage, Actual (Current Users) vs. Expected (Potential Adopters)
Source: Enterprise Strategy Group, 2011
SSDs can deliver orders-of-magnitude improvements in I/O over traditional hard disk drives (HDDs), offering
organizations the opportunity to reduce storage bottlenecks, speed application performance, and minimize latency.
While these features are beneficial in physical server environments, they become crucial in virtualized
environments in which workloads are aggregated and I/O becomes increasingly randomized.
The challenge for
many organizations is to know how to apply SSD for maximum benefit. Identifying what applications and data will
be “hot” at what time and for how long is difficult at best, and as a result, manually assigning SSD to specific
applications or VMs is a hit-or-miss proposition.
1
Source: ESG Research Report,
Solid-state Storage Market Trends
,
November 2011.
32%
31%
23%
35%
34%
45%
69%
22%
30%
32%
36%
36%
42%
52%
0%
20%
40%
60%
80%
Reduced/deferred hardware
capital expenditures
Improved total cost of ownership
(TCO)
Improved SLAs
Reduced operational expenses
Improved resource utilization
Reduced power consumption
Improved application performance
Which of the following benefits has your organization realized – or does it
expect to realize – as the result of deploying solid-state storage technology?
(Percent of respondents, multiple responses accepted)
Current solid-
state storage
users (N=91)
Potential
solid-state
storage
adopters
(N=132)
