EMC unveils data storage platform VF Cache

STORAGE VENDOR EMC has launched a data storage product based on its Project Lightning, called VF Cache, in a bid to deliver flash memory technology to big-tin server users.

The use of a sold-state disk (SSD) storage designed for use in high-demand server applications allows vital information to be stored and delivered through a high-speed PCIe connection.

EMC Flash business unit senior director of product marketing and management Barry Ader said that by embedding the SSD on a PCIe card, the company could dramatically speed the performance of its storage subsystems and overcome the speed mismatch between the processors and storage units.

"The Intel chipset is doing an amazing job of following Moore's law, but disk drives are not," Ader said.

"This is causing a gap between what the disk drives are able to deliver and what the CPUs are able to consume."

The company believes the VF Cache can help to close much of that gap. EMC estimates that data stored in VF Cache can be delivered up to 4,000 times faster than from conventional disk drives.

The VF Cache system will initially target high-performance markets such as trading applications and financial transaction systems. Soon, however, the company hopes to expand the product line with the release of its 'Thunder' system.

Using the same principles as the VF Cache cards, the Thunder system will expand the system to a large-scale appliance capable of delivering extremely high-speed transactions.

"Think of it as taking multiple VF Caches and bringing them together in a single appliance," Ader said.

"It is now much more scalable, it is sharable across multiple servers and the result of the performance can now be measured in millions of I/O operations and the sustained performance can be measured in less than 200 microseconds." µ