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What hypervisors do for server utilization, 3PAR® thin technologies do for storage capacity utilization. Gone are the days of throwing more disks at your storage problems. Tight IT budgets require that new applications be deployed on thin storage that’s designed to stay thin.
3PAR's thin technologies can save you 50% or more on the cost of a storage technology refresh by dramatically reducing overall capacity requirements and keeping utilization rates high over time. Thin technologies from 3PAR not only minimize your up-front and ongoing storage costs, but also the cost of housing, powering, cooling, and managing your storage.
Thin Built In and the 3PAR Gen3 ASIC The 3PAR Gen3 ASIC features a silicon-based, zero-detection mechanism for converting traditional “fat” volumes to "thin" volumes without impacting storage performance. The Gen3 ASIC works with 3PAR’s own Thin Engine—a software-based virtualization mapping engine for space reclamation—to give 3PAR arrays the power to remove allocated but unused space in existing volumes.
Getting Thin and Staying Thin To optimize cost savings, thin environments must stay thin. Not only does 3PAR give you the ability to start thin with 3PAR Thin Provisioning, but to get thin with 3PAR Thin Conversion and then stay thin with 3PAR Thin Persistence and Thin Reclamation solutions. These technologies keep your storage lean and efficient. In addition, for environments that use VMware vSphere™, Microsoft® Windows® (with SDelete), and Oracle® (with the ASM Storage Reclamation Utility), Thin Persistence can help free significant amounts of stranded storage.
Multiply Your Savings, Not Your Unused Space 3PAR thin technologies—including 3PAR Thin Copy Reclamation—work with 3PAR Remote Copy and 3PAR Virtual Copy to eliminate the replication of unused space within base volumes as well as copies so you can stop multiplying your unused space and start multiplying your savings. Whenever “fat” volumes are copied on traditional arrays, the extra space within those volumes is also copied. As if this weren’t enough, volume copies created for data recovery purposes can compound this waste by replicating the empty space yet again. The resulting inefficiency is a serious challenge, particularly in virtual server and virtual desktop deployments where large amounts of capacity are typically required at the outset.
The 3PAR Thin Ecosystem 3PAR continues to work with partners to build a thin ecosystem to extend the benefits of thin technologies to other areas of your datacenter.
3PAR and Oracle® offer the industry’s first database storage reclamation solution, currently available only on 3PAR Utility Storage arrays. With this solution, Oracle Database 10g and 11g customers using Oracle Automatic Storage Management (ASM) and 3PAR Thin Provisioning can now reclaim allocated but unused disk space using 3PAR Thin Persistence and the new Oracle ASM Storage Reclamation Utility (ASRU).
3PAR and Symantec™ have also pioneered a Thin Reclamation API that allows host file systems to intelligently communicate with the 3PAR InServ® Storage Server to reclaim space associated with file deletions. Leveraging the 3PAR Thin Engine, 3PAR Thin Reclamation for Veritas Storage Foundation is the first platform solution to take advantage of this Thin Reclamation API. As more file system vendors integrate this capability, which is presently driving the emerging T10 thin provisioning standard, not only will their file systems work with 3PAR arrays to reclaim unused space, but datacenters will move closer to becoming "thin by design."
In VMware vSphere™ environments, 3PAR Thin Persistence ensures storage capacity efficiency by maintaining the thinness of all three vSphere virtual machine disk (VMDK) formats at the storage layer. In addition, 3PAR Thin Persistence, combined with the built-in zero-detection capability of the 3PAR Gen3 ASIC, delivers performance benefits while eliminating the capacity tradeoffs associated with the highest-performing VMDK format, Eager Zeroed Thick.
3PAR Thin Technologies
Slash Your Storage Technology Refresh Costs by 50% or More
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What hypervisors do for server utilization, 3PAR® thin technologies do for storage capacity utilization. Gone are the days of throwing more disks at your storage problems. Tight IT budgets require that new applications be deployed on thin storage that’s designed to stay thin.
3PAR's thin technologies can save you 50% or more on the cost of a storage technology refresh by dramatically reducing overall capacity requirements and keeping utilization rates high over time. Thin technologies from 3PAR not only minimize your up-front and ongoing storage costs, but also the cost of housing, powering, cooling, and managing your storage.
Thin Built In and the 3PAR Gen3 ASIC The 3PAR Gen3 ASIC features a silicon-based, zero-detection mechanism for converting traditional “fat” volumes to "thin" volumes without impacting storage performance. The Gen3 ASIC works with 3PAR’s own Thin Engine—a software-based virtualization mapping engine for space reclamation—to give 3PAR arrays the power to remove allocated but unused space in existing volumes.
Getting Thin and Staying Thin To optimize cost savings, thin environments must stay thin. Not only does 3PAR give you the ability to start thin with 3PAR Thin Provisioning, but to get thin with 3PAR Thin Conversion and then stay thin with 3PAR Thin Persistence and Thin Reclamation solutions. These technologies keep your storage lean and efficient. In addition, for environments that use VMware vSphere™, Microsoft® Windows® (with SDelete), and Oracle® (with the ASM Storage Reclamation Utility), Thin Persistence can help free significant amounts of stranded storage.
Multiply Your Savings, Not Your Unused Space 3PAR thin technologies—including 3PAR Thin Copy Reclamation—work with 3PAR Remote Copy and 3PAR Virtual Copy to eliminate the replication of unused space within base volumes as well as copies so you can stop multiplying your unused space and start multiplying your savings. Whenever “fat” volumes are copied on traditional arrays, the extra space within those volumes is also copied. As if this weren’t enough, volume copies created for data recovery purposes can compound this waste by replicating the empty space yet again. The resulting inefficiency is a serious challenge, particularly in virtual server and virtual desktop deployments where large amounts of capacity are typically required at the outset.
The 3PAR Thin Ecosystem 3PAR continues to work with partners to build a thin ecosystem to extend the benefits of thin technologies to other areas of your datacenter.
3PAR and Oracle® offer the industry’s first database storage reclamation solution, currently available only on 3PAR Utility Storage arrays. With this solution, Oracle Database 10g and 11g customers using Oracle Automatic Storage Management (ASM) and 3PAR Thin Provisioning can now reclaim allocated but unused disk space using 3PAR Thin Persistence and the new Oracle ASM Storage Reclamation Utility (ASRU).
3PAR and Symantec™ have also pioneered a Thin Reclamation API that allows host file systems to intelligently communicate with the 3PAR InServ® Storage Server to reclaim space associated with file deletions. Leveraging the 3PAR Thin Engine, 3PAR Thin Reclamation for Veritas Storage Foundation is the first platform solution to take advantage of this Thin Reclamation API. As more file system vendors integrate this capability, which is presently driving the emerging T10 thin provisioning standard, not only will their file systems work with 3PAR arrays to reclaim unused space, but datacenters will move closer to becoming "thin by design."
In VMware vSphere™ environments, 3PAR Thin Persistence ensures storage capacity efficiency by maintaining the thinness of all three vSphere virtual machine disk (VMDK) formats at the storage layer. In addition, 3PAR Thin Persistence, combined with the built-in zero-detection capability of the 3PAR Gen3 ASIC, delivers performance benefits while eliminating the capacity tradeoffs associated with the highest-performing VMDK format, Eager Zeroed Thick.
Technologies
Learn More (see all)
3PAR Thin Provisioning (PDF)
3PAR Thin Conversion (PDF)
3PAR Thin Persistence (PDF)
3PAR Thin Technologies (PDF)
Wikibon Case Study: Evaluating the Virtualization and Thin Provisioning Benefits Achieved by 3PAR Customers (Website)
3PAR Thin Conversion (PDF)
3PAR Thin Persistence (PDF)
3PAR Thin Technologies (PDF)
Wikibon Case Study: Evaluating the Virtualization and Thin Provisioning Benefits Achieved by 3PAR Customers (Website)
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