StorONE enables HDD connectivity over NVMe-oF

StorONE has introduced what it claims is the first storage platform to enable connectivity between standard mechanical hard disk drives (HDD) and flash drives over NVMe-over Fabric (NVMe-oF) infrastructures, which it says can reduce the cost of an NVMe solution by tenfold or more.

Storage arrays have traditionally been separated by drive make. You have all-flash arrays and all-hard-disk arrays but not a mix of the two. Typical operation is to put “hot” data, or data that is frequently accessed, on the much faster SSDs, and put less frequently accessed data on the slower HDDs. That approach requires two or more separate arrays, plus the connection between them.

StorONE’s new Enterprise Storage Platform can connect to the network via NVMe-oF and operate the same way – frequently accessed data on the SSDs, less used data on the HDDs. This means enterprises can mix and match the drives in one array. StorONE’s management software automatically shifts data between the two drive types as needed. So an enterprise can build a more affordable platform that delivers both the high IOPS from the SSDs and the affordable retention from the HDDs.

And good news for existing StorONE customers – they can add the HDD over NVMe-oF capability through a software update at no additional charge if they’ve already deployed an NVMe-oF storage system.

“Our platform approach to storage not only means supporting a wide variety of use cases but also new protocols, like NVMe-oF. At the same time, we make sure our customers can continue to leverage their existing investment, eliminating the need for costly storage migrations,” said Gal Naor, CEO of StorONE, in a statement.

StorONE’s Enterprise Storage Platform’s supports a fairly broad array of protocols simultaneously, including iSCSI, Fibre Channel, NFS, SMB, S3 and NVMe-oF.