Game changer...but at what price
This is definitely a game changer. Compared to XtremIO which puts out a mere 150K IOPs for a 36TB-equivalent config, this seems to be orders of magnitude higher in terms of IOPs and much better in terms of latencies. Kudos to the DSSD team for pulling this off!
However there are some drawbacks
It's an expensive box. This link below says $1M for entry level config. That is expensive.
http://www.storagereview.com/emc_introduces_the_dssd_d5
Also, the PCIe connectivity means that this cannot be used in general by Enterprises pre-wired for FC or Ethernet connectivity. So unlike other Flash systems, this is not a plug and play. There is no mention of Enterprise class features such as snaps. And it seems like app plugins are needed. "Rack-scale Flash" would mean no choice on servers except for VCE. A great strategy by EMC to rake in more $'s, however customers will suffer from lack of choice.
But nothing can take away what the DSSD folks have achieved here - this is a great box. Hope to see more of these kinds of systems in the future with Enterprise class connectivity options and more features, and of course at a palatable price
Biting the hand that feeds IT
