UPDATED 20:30 EDT / MAY 11 2017

BIG DATA

Dell EMC redesigns Isilon to store more using less space

With current storage trends in the enterprise, including all-flash and virtualization capabilities, there is an increasing demand for more performance and unconstrained scalability without compromising on enterprise features or protocols, according to Eric Seidman (pictured), senior manager of product marketing, Emerging Technologies Division, at Dell EMC. Plus businesses demand security and protection from their storage platforms.

“We took a look at how we architected the Isilon hardware, brought in all these different considerations and then went back to our engineering and said, ‘You need to make the number one, mass scale-out platform in the industry even better,'” Seidman said. “And … they developed a completely new architecture that goes from the traditional node in a chassis to being able to put that same type of node in a lot smaller space.”

One of the more eagerly awaited product launches at this year’s Dell EMC World event in Las Vegas, Nevada, was the launch of the next generation of several Dell EMC all-flash storage products. Foremost among those was the Isilon scale-out Network-Attached Storage, which featured a completely redesigned architecture. Isilon was already an industry leader within their sector of the all-flash market, but industry demands for even greater enhancements and capabilities while working with existing customer constraints was really the driving factor behind the decision to do a full architectural redesign, Seidman explained.

Seidman stopped by to chat with Rebecca Knight (@knightrm) and Paul Gillin (@pgillin), co-hosts of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile live-streaming studio, during Dell EMC World. (* Disclosure below.)

Seidman spoke with the analysts about the reasoning behind the decision to redesign the Isilon scale-out NAS platform, as well as some of the more exciting use cases he has seen that were made possible by advances in all-flash technology.

Enabling profound new capabilities

Years ago, the advent of the Storage Area Network and shared block-level storage began to change how storage was perceived on local networks. Initially, storage devices were expensive, so having servers share a single storage or storage arrays was seen for its immediate benefit, Seidman explained. Additionally, having many applications use the same storage array was also a game changer. It promoted further development in storage technology, which, combined with the steady drop in storage space, set the stage for incredible advances in storage technology we see today, he added.

“With Isilon, that scale-out capability for file protocols has kind of been that same type of breakthrough where we can now consolidate multiple types of workflows from many, many different data types and applications,” Seidman said. “We have customers consolidating tens, hundreds of different applications on a single Isilon cluster, because it can scale in performance and capacity and can support so many different protocols.”

With advancing scale-out NAS technologies like Isilon, industries such as the motion picture industry are using it to assist their filmmaking, because the control it gives them of such massive quantities of data generated by high-definition recording allows them to view a day’s work without having to wait for compression. But in Seidman’s opinion, Hollywood is not where the most promising application of this technology lies:

“We were just in a meeting with one of our great customers, TGen, and they’re doing life-saving research,” Seidman said. “And movies are great and all, but it’s kind of different on the scale of what we can do to help mankind. So, obviously, life sciences and healthcare is just a huge benefit.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s independent editorial coverage of Dell EMC World 2017(* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for Dell EMC World. Neither Dell nor other sponsors have editorial influence on content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE

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