It was exciting to hear about increasing adoption and new AWS Outposts form factors during the first week of AWS re:Invent 2020. More organizations are adopting cloud-first, hybrid-cloud strategies and deploying AWS architecture on-premises. As a result, they need a comprehensive storage strategy to unlock the full potential of Outposts in their data centers.
Today, Pure Storage® FlashArray™ achieved the Outposts Ready designation within the AWS Service Ready Program. AWS tests solutions for ease of deployment, performance, and high availability. FlashArray has earned AWS’s approval to run alongside an Outpost in customer and partner data centers.
FlashArray joins FlashBlade® in achieving Outposts Ready status. FlashArray provides enterprise-class 100% NVMe all-flash block storage, while FlashBlade provides unified fast file and object storage for on-prem. Combined, they deliver the industry’s first portfolio of modern block, file, and object storage that is AWS Outposts Ready. With them, you get simplified and proven deployment options for on-premises and hybrid-cloud infrastructure.
AWS Outposts is a fully managed service. It extends AWS infrastructure and services, APIs, and tools to virtually any data center, colocation space, or on-premises facility for an authentic hybrid-cloud experience. AWS provides the same hardware and software experience of the cloud and extends it to on-premises platforms. Outpost direct-attached storage is currently limited to 100TB. Pair it with FlashArray to extend external storage capacity and add enterprise-class capabilities.
Modern Enterprise Features
FlashArray is an industry leader in primary storage arrays for enterprise applications. These include mission-critical databases, private-cloud infrastructure, virtualized desktop infrastructure, and other core business applications. In these instances, local data processing, residency, and low latency requirements are critical. FlashArray//X’s latency is as low as 150 μs to address performance-sensitive databases and applications. Meanwhile, FlashArray//C addresses capacity-optimized data requirements for enterprise all-flash features and data services with lower per-TB cost and relative performance.
Coupled with AWS Outposts, AWS services, APIs, and tools, FlashArray delivers modern enterprise features, including:
- Industry-leading data reduction
- Snapshots
- Built-in replication
- Quality of service (QoS)
- Encryption with data reduction of in-flight data
Deploying FlashArray with an AWS Outpost rack was simple and automated during testing for the Outposts Ready designation. The process was equal to deploying industry-standard servers, but with the added built-in simplicity of FlashArray. Latency was sub-1ms on average and as low as 0.3 ms. IOPs and bandwidth were consistent with the high performance FlashArray regularly achieves for mission-critical databases such as SQL Server, Oracle, and SAP Hana. It also delivers high performance for modern cloud-native applications including MySQL, MongoDB, and Cassandra.
Figure 1: Diagram of FlashArray with AWS Outposts architecture
Features for Availability and Financial Flexibility
Performance isn’t FlashArray’s only high-value benefit. The Purity Operating Environment powers every FlashArray device and delivers ActiveCluster™ and ActiveDR™, modern data-protection features that can increase the availability of AWS Outposts.
Designed for business continuity, ActiveCluster provides simple-to-deploy, seamless, automatic failover with active-active replication between metro distance data centers. And for near-zero RPO, ActiveDR provides disaster recovery between connected FlashArray devices regardless of location around the globe. In addition, the Evergreen™ architecture and subscription model provides the latest features with non-disruptive software and hardware upgrades.
For financial flexibility, choose to purchase FlashArray via traditional CAPEX methods or through the Pure as-a-Service™ storage-as-a-service (STaaS) model. This OPEX-based*, pay-as-you-go offering transforms your enterprise storage environment into a highly efficient utility. It supports block, file, and object storage services that you can deploy on-premises, in a co-location facility, and in the public cloud.
If you’re looking for an enterprise cloud experience for AWS on-premises, give Pure or your Pure Storage partner a call to learn more about FlashArray and FlashBlade for Outposts. Additionally, Portworx, the most complete Kubernetes data-services platform, has joined the Pure family and is also AWS Outposts Ready.
Whatever your enterprise storage needs are, Pure has you covered.
More Resources
Pure Storage Announces Pure as a Service in AWS Marketplace Press Release
Pure Delivers Hybrid Cloud with AWS Outposts Support
*OPEX treatment is subject to customer’s auditor review.
