FEATURE BRIEF
NexGen Storage and VMware Virtual Volumes
With the introduction of Virtual Volumes (VVOL) with vSphere 6.0, VMware is
making a monumental leap forward in how storage is provisioned and
managed for virtual machines. VMware Virtual Volumes allows storage to be
managed on a per-VM basis. Gone are the days of managing storage on a perLUN and/or per-Datastore basis.
NexGen is partnered with VMware to integrate the NexGen N5 Hybrid Flash
array with vSphere 6.0 and Virtual Volumes. VMware has enabled storage
vendors to integrate to the base VVOL APIs and to extend those APIs to allow
for vendor-specific integration. This allows the native NexGen storage QoS and
Service Level policies to be easily surfaced directly within vCenter as a VM
Storage Policy.
In addition to simplifying the overall storage provisioning and management of
virtual machines, NexGen’s VVOL integration provides the following benefits:
ELIMINATE
STORAGE SILOS
GRANULAR VM
PERFORMANCE
MANAGEMENT
POLICY-BASED
SIMPLICITY
Software Defined Performance enables best-in-class consolidation

Define multiple storage performance tiers in a single NexGen N5 array

Host different storage performance levels on the same storage pool

Eliminate storage silos based on storage media (HDD, SSD, Flash)

Migrate performance of the VM on-the-fly (no vMotion needed).
Provision and Manage Storage Performance with VM granularity

Assign storage QoS and Service Levels on a per-VM basis

Policy-based prioritization aligns individual workloads with their business value

Live and historical VM performance metrics and monitoring

Real-time VM data movement between Flash and Disk based on QoS settings
Simple, Policy-based QoS Management at the VM Level

Select one of five QoS policies that manage VM IOPS, Throughput and Latency

Preconfigured policies eliminate planning and setup tasks; less error-prone

Modify VM storage QoS policies on-the-fly for immediate performance change

Integrated with vCenter management via NexGen VASA 2.0 Provider
FEATURE BRIEF – NexGen Storage and VMware Virtual Volumes
Virtual Volume Integration Considerations
Not all implementations of VVOL integration are created equal. At NexGen, we believe that there are four
different levels of integration that vendors are providing. The following graphic summarizes the four integration
levels. NexGen is the only vendor to provide Per-VM Storage QoS integration with Virtual Volumes with
simple Policy-based management.
Deployment and Availability
Customers that wish to deploy Virtual Volumes with their NexGen N5 Hybrid Flash Array, require the following
technologies:
VMware
vSphere 6.0
Available now from VMware.
NexGen
ioControl 3.5
Available Mid-2015.
Virtual Volumes is offered with the Standard, Enterprise and Enterprise Plus editions of
vSphere.
Virtual Volumes support is delivered with the ioControl 3.5 software. The ioControl 3.5
software will be available on newly shipping product or as an upgrade to installed product.
New deployments of vSphere 6.0 and NexGen ioControl 3.5 can take advantage of
Virtual Volumes by simply deploying new VMs to a VVOL datastore container. Existing
VMs can be migrated to a VVOL datastore container using VMware Storage vMotion.
FEATURE BRIEF – NexGen Storage and VMware Virtual Volumes