IBM Storwize V7000 and Storwize V7000 Unified Disk Systems

The most powerful and easy-to-use innovative disk systems in the storage marketplace 

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Highlights

  • Deliver sophisticated, enterprise-class storage functionality for businesses
  • Support your growing business requirements while controlling costs
  • Provide up to three times performance improvement by moving as little as five percent of data to flash storage1
  • Enable storing up to five times more active primary data in the same physical disk space using IBM® Real-time Compression2
  • Consolidate block and file storage for simplicity, greater efficiency and ease of management
  • Enable near-continuous availability of applications through dynamic migration.
  • Easy-to-use data management designed with a graphical user interface (GUI) and point-and-click system management capabilities
  • Metro Mirror and Global Mirror for replicating data synchronously or asynchronously between systems for backup efficiency
  • Flash storage for applications that demand high speed and quick access to data
  • Redundant array of independent disks (RAID) 0, 1, 5, 6 and 10.

Consider the challenges that IT organisations typically face in these complex environments. Sharing storage among servers is often impossible, but relieving the problem by deploying tiered storage can be difficult. Isolated server and storage management tools reduce IT productivity, but when data migration processes are implemented, they can disrupt business operations. Meanwhile, organisations are concerned about the growing costs of storage and storage management. They often are unable to use virtualised storage as they use virtual servers, as a tool to optimise expenditures, resources and capabilities.

In storage management today, breaking the cycle of increased complexity and explosive data growth can be a big challenge. The old ways of buying and managing storage have become less effective. Due to resource constraints – both physical storage resources and human resources – IT organisations must act quickly to optimise and simplify their infrastructure. Unchecked complexity and growth will only become bigger problems over time.

To stand up to these challenges and allow businesses to respond to a rapidly changing marketplace, IBM Storwize V7000 and Storwize V7000 Unified are virtualised storage systems to complement virtualised server environments that provide extraordinary performance, availability, advanced functions and highly-scalable capacity never seen before in midrange disk systems.

As members of the IBM Storwize family, Storwize V7000 and Storwize V7000 Unified are powerful midrange disk systems that have been designed to be easy to use and to enable rapid deployment without additional resources. Storwize V7000 supports block workloads, whereas Storwize V7000 Unified consolidates block and file workloads into a single storage system for simplicity of management and reduced cost.

Storwize V7000 and Storwize V7000 Unified offer greater efficiency and flexibility through built-in flash storage optimisation and thin-provisioning technologies. Integrated IBM Real-time Compression enhances efficiency even further by enabling storing up to five times as much active primary data in the same physical disk space.2 Storwize V7000 and Storwize V7000 Unified advanced functions also enable non-disruptive migration of data from existing storage, simplifying implementation and minimising disruption to users. Finally, these systems also enable you to virtualise and reuse existing disk systems, supporting a greater potential return on investment (ROI).

Product features Hardware summary
  • Automatic migration of frequently accessed data to high performance flash storage
  • Provisioning support for business applications that need to grow dynamically, but only consume the storage space they are actually using
  • Migration capabilities that provide efficiency and business value in a nondisruptive migration
  • IBM Real-time Compression for extraordinary efficiency, enabling storage of up to five times as much active data in the same physical disk space*
  • Unified storage capability for greater simplicity and efficiency
  • Policy-based file management
  • Support for near-instant data copies for backup or application testing
  • Integrated instant copy capabilities for critical business needs
  • Integrated tools and capabilities for server and storage management
  • Clustered systems to support growing business needs while controlling costs
  • 2U rack-mountable chassis
  • Twenty four 2.5-in. drive bays or twelve 3.5-in. drive bays
  • Up to 48 TB of physical storage per enclosure using 4 TB nearline serial attached SCSI (SAS) disk drives, or up to 28.8 TB physical storage per enclosure using 1.2 TB SAS disk drives
  • SAS disk drives, nearline SAS disk drives and solid-state drives (SSDs)
  • Redundant dual-active intelligent controllers
  • 16 GB cache memory per control enclosure (8 GB per internal controller)
  • For each control enclosure: Eight 8 Gbps FC ports (four 8 Gbps FC ports per controller), four 1 Gbps iSCSI and optionally four 10 Gbps iSCSI/FCoE host ports (two 1 Gbps iSCSI and optionally two 10 Gbps iSCSI/FCoE ports per controller)
  • For each file module, Four 1 Gbps and two 10 Gbps ports provide connectivity to NAS environments; two FC ports connect to Storwize V7000 control enclosures
  • Control enclosure supports attachment of up to nine expansion enclosures with configurations up to 480 TB physical storage capacities (up to 1.92 PB in clustered systems)
  • Dual power supplies and cooling components

1 IBM lab measurements – August 2010

2 IBM lab measurements – April 2012

* IBM lab measurements – April 2012

Feature Benefits
IBM Systems Director
  • Provides integrated management for physical and virtual server infrastructures, including monitoring and repairing for higher availability and operational efficiency
IBM Flex System Manager
  • With IBM PureFlex Systems, provides management integration of physical and virtual compute, storage and networking resources from a single vantage point.
Dynamic migration
  • Provides efficiency and business value in a nondisruptive migration function
IBM System Storage Easy Tier
  • Provides automatic migration of frequently accessed data elements to high-performing SSDs
Clustered systems
  • Enable growth from the smallest configurations up to systems with 960 drives (up to 1.92 PB capacity)
Thin provisioning
  • Supports business applications that need to grow dynamically, while consuming only the space actually used
Unified storage
  • Combines block and file storage requirements into a single system for simplicity and efficiency
  • Single user interface for managing both block and file storage streamlines administration
IBM FlashCopy
  • Creates a near-instant copy of active data that can be used for backup or for parallel processing activities; supports backup for recovering corrupted data
SSD
  • For applications that demand high disk speed, quick access to data and support for tiered storage environments
IBM Active Cloud Engine
  • Reduces costs through policy-based management of files through use of tiered storage and improves data governance
  • Automates movement of less-frequently used files to lower cost tiers of storage, including tape in an IBM Tivoli Storage Manager system
  • Automates deletion of unwanted or expired files
  • Caches files at remote locations to help improve performance and reduce networking cost
IBM Tivoli Storage FlashCopy Manager
  • Helps minimise the impact of backups, provides near-instant restore, shortens backup and recovery times, simplifies management and automates routine tasks
Metro Mirror and Global Mirror
  • Allows synchronous or asynchronous data replication between systems for backup efficiency; used as failover in disaster recovery (DR) and for remote copy over distances
IBM Real-time Compression
  • IBM Real-time Compression is designed to improve efficiency by storing up to five times as much active primary data in the same physical disk space.* By significantly reducing storage requirements, you can keep up to five times more information online, use the improved efficiency to reduce storage costs, or achieve a combination of greater capacity and reduced cost.

* IBM lab measurements – April 2012

Host interface SAN-attached 8 Gbps FC, 1 Gbps iSCSI and optional 10 Gbps iSCSI/FCoE
NAS-attached 1 Gbps and 10 Gbps Ethernet
User interface Graphical user interface (GUI)
Supported drives 3.5-in. disk drives:
  • 2 TB, 3 TB, 4 TB 7.2k nearline SAS disk
2.5 in. disk drives:
  • 146 GB, 300 GB 15k SAS disk
  • 300 GB, 600 GB, 900 GB, 1.2 TB 10k SAS disk
  • 200 GB, 400 GB E-MLC SSD
  • 1 TB 7.2k nearline SAS disk
RAID levels RAID 0, 1, 5, 6 and 10
Maximum drives supported 240 per control enclosure; 960 per clustered system
Fans and power supplies Fully redundant, hot-swappable
Rack support Standard 19 in.
Management software Storwize V7000 and Storwize V7000 Unified software
Cache per controller/control enclosure/clustered system 8 GB/16 GB/64 GB
Advanced features included with each system System Storage Easy Tier, FlashCopy, thin provisioning, Active Cloud Engine (Storwize V7000 Unified only)
Additional available advanced features Remote mirroring, external virtualisation unified storage, FlashCopy Manager, IBM Tivoli Storage Productivity Centre Select, Tivoli Storage Manager, Tivoli Storage Manager FastBack, IBM Systems Director, Flex System Manager, IBM Real-time Compression
Warranty Hardware:
  • 3-year limited warranty
  • Customer-replaceable units
  • On-site service
  • Next business day 09:00 to 17:00
  • Service upgrades available
Software:
  • Software maintenance agreement available
Replication services FlashCopy, FlashCopy Manager, Metro Mirror (synchronous), Global Mirror (asynchronous), local and asynchronous remote file-based replication
Dimensions Control and expansion enclosures
  • Width: 483 mm (19.0 in.)
  • Depth: 630 mm (24.8 in.)
  • Height: 87.9 mm (3.46 in.)
File Modules
  • Width: 443 mm (17.5 in.)
  • Depth: 698 mm (27.5 in.)
  • Height: 85 mm (3.36 in.)
Weight 12-bay enclosures:
  • Drive-ready (without drive modules installed): 17.7 kg (37.6 lb)
  • Fully configured (12 drive modules installed): 27.2 kg (59.8 lb)
24-bay enclosures:
  • Drive-ready (without drive modules installed): 17.7 kg (37.6 lb)
  • Fully configured (24 drive modules installed): 25.2 kg (55.4 lb)
File modules
  • Maximum configuration: 29.6 kg (65 lb)
Supported systems For a list of currently supported servers, operating systems, host bus adapters, clustering applications and SAN switches and directors, refer to the System Storage Interoperation Centre.
ISV solutions For a list of high quality solutions with our partner ISVs, including access to solution briefs and white papers, refer to the ISV Solutions Resource Library.

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