{"id":8450,"date":"2022-11-12T19:25:45","date_gmt":"2022-11-12T17:25:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/?p=8450"},"modified":"2022-11-12T20:11:07","modified_gmt":"2022-11-12T18:11:07","slug":"what-is-vmax3-an-overview-of-its-architecture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tekmart.co.za\/t-blog\/what-is-vmax3-an-overview-of-its-architecture\/","title":{"rendered":"What is VMAX3? An overview of its architecture with examples."},"content":{"rendered":"Reading Time-approximately:<\/span> 4<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>\n

The EMC VMAX3 is a family of SAN arrays designed for enterprise environments requiring large amounts of storage.<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Post courtesy of: Vince Westin<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

EMC announced the latest new systems in the VMAX3 family. The new systems are the 100K, the 200K, and the 400K, known collectively as the VMAX3 Family. They are updated versions of the 10K, 20K, and 40K. In addition to all the software enhancements, the systems have all new hardware and packaging. With the new dual engine system bays, the number of bays lines up directly with the names of the systems: the 100K uses 1 bay, the 200K uses up to 2 bays, and the 400K uses up to 4 bays. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This post is focused on the hardware and packaging across these new systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The VMAX3\u00a0Family-100K, 200K, and 400K<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>The VMAX3 Family systems are packaged with one or two engines per system bay, and all bays are 24\u201d wide (19\u201d internal rails). Each bay also contains DAEs holding the disk drives for the engines. These new denser configurations take up much less floor space. For example, the densest drive bay for a 40K holds 400 x 2.5\u201d drives. A new single engine system bay holds up to 720 x 2.5\u201d drives and one engine. A new dual engine system bay holds 480 x 2.5\u201d drives and two engines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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One challenge of a system\u2019s density is weight. The older VMAX3 systems have batteries to keep drives spinning should both power feeds to a cabinet become unavailable. They needed this because the storage for writes in cache was on those disk drives. The new VMAX3 systems have added flash drives to the engines, and the system will save the writes from cache to those flash drives in the event of such a loss of cabinet power. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a result, the new systems only have batteries for the engines and the Dynamic Virtual Matrix. By removing the batteries for the drives, the new systems are usually lighter per cabinet than the systems they replace, even though they have a much smaller physical footprint for a given capacity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Each VMAX3 engine holds 2 directors with a common set of features:<\/p>\n\n\n\n