In the ever-changing world of data storage and cloud computing, companies such as IBM continually seek ways to gain an edge over the competition. IBM believes its high-end storage solution XIV is a cut above. With the XIV storage system, IBM looks to provide predictable and consistent high performance that is extremely easy to use, provides excellent data economics, and is ideal for use with the cloud.
In a recent interview at the IBM Edge 2014 conference with Ori Bauer, director of XIV worldwide development at IBM, and Sidney Chow, vice president and business line executive for enterprise disk storage at IBM, theCUBE’s John Furrier and Dave Vellante asked about the XIV system and how IBM has been working to meet high-end storage demands.

The Importance of High-End Storage

When asked to explain high end, Chow commented that for high-end storage the most important considerations include resiliency of the storage unit and the availability of data. Because we live in a 24/7 world, businesses expect to access their data at a moment’s notice, and high-end provides this access.

Performance is another area that IBM has tried to improve upon with XIV. This includes low latency and high IOPs to handle the increased workload that companies find themselves dealing with. Furthermore, according to Chow, “Most importantly, you must be able to do this with unpredictable demands that are coming in and out. Those two things are absolutely critical for high end. Any high-end storage device must meet these two criteria.”

IOPs and Bandwidth

When asked about quality of service and if IBM can provision capacity, thus guaranteeing IOPs and bandwidth, Bauer responded by saying with IBM’s XIV storage system, organizations are provided an upper limit of maximum number of IOPS that a customer can get to. Though, with the addition of flash into the IBM arrays, it has become easier to provide a minimum capability.

Better yet, customers can change their policy on the fly, allowing IBM to “provide the different tenants with different levels of quality of service,” according to Bauer.