Tag Archives: netapp

Brisbane VMUG – July 2026

Posted on by

The July 2026 edition of the Brisbane VMUG meeting will be held on Thursday 23rd July at the NetApp Office, Level 17, Central Plaza II, 66 Eagle Street, Brisbane from 3pm – 6:30pm. It’s sponsored by NetApp, Ingram Micro, and Broadcom and promises to be a great afternoon.

Here’s the agenda:

3pm – VMUG Leader Intro

3.10-4pm – Unlock unrealised value from your VCF deployments with NetApp ONTAP 9.1

Presented by Chris Gondek – Solutions Engineering Manager, Australia and New Zealand, NetApp and Wade Juppenlatz – Technical Business Development Manager, Ingram Micro

Live demonstration of the NetApp Data Infrastructure insights Observability of VMware environments.

  • Showcasing where there are opportunities to right size
  • Where there is over/under utilisation/provisioning
  • Where there is opportunity to reclaim waste
  • Audience Participation / interaction where you can ask your own questions to the NetApp AI chat bot on VMware environments
  • Always popular, you can ask anything that you would want, in natural language like “show me where I save on VMware licensing cost”, etc)
  • Trident for TANZU / VKS
  • Our ONTAP tools for VMware integration / UX demo
  • Broader VMware in cloud and the NetApp Console Canvas
  • Shift Toolkit (Convert/Migrate other HyperVisor environments to VMware)

4-4.30pm – VCF 9.1 Introduction and Updates from Broadcom

Presented by Peter Hauck, Staff Solutions Architect, Broadcom

4.30-5pm – Community Session (tbc)

5pm onwards – Networking, Pizza, vBeers and Giveaways!

You can find out more information and register for the event here.

Random Short Take #103

Posted on by

Random short take #103. Want news? You’re probably not in the right place. Let’s get random.

NetApp Cloud Storage Announcements – February 2025

Posted on by

 

NetApp recently made some announcements around its cloud storage capabilities as part of a larger series of product announcements. I thought I’d share some notes and some brief thoughts here.

 

Azure NetApp Files

New capability – Cost optimisation

New capability – Resilience

There’s also preview support for backing up large volumes and performing single file restores from backup.

 

Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP

There’s a new AWS CloudFormation package Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP that unlocks advanced ONTAP operations, including:

  • SnapMirror creation (including ClusterPeer and SVM Peer);
  • iSCSI (LUN and iGroup) creation;
  • CIFS Share creation;
  • Snapshot and Snapshot Policy creation; and
  • Advanced Volume creation.

[image courtesy of NetApp]

 

Thoughts

Why am I writing about FSx for NetApp ONTAP on my weblog? And why should you be interested in a few minor enhancements to this and to Azure NetApp Files? How do these technologies even make sense when the benefits of public cloud are right there? Why would organisations not just use the hyperscaler-native storage solutions available to them? It’s for the same reason that numerous organisations have adopted VMware Cloud on AWS and Azure VMware Solution, sometimes your applications need something different to what the public cloud can offer, at least until those applications have undergone some kind of transformation. I have plenty of customers in my day job taking advantage of FSx for NetApp ONTAP with their VMware Cloud on AWS deployments because the linear scalability of hyper-converged infrastructure has proven problematic for storage-heavy workloads. Additionally, they get the benefit of being able to leverage the NetApp tools they know and love, just in a cloud context. It’s great to see NetApp continue to add features and functionality to both Azure NetApp Files and FSx for NetApp ONTAP. If you’re struggling with shifting storage-dense workloads to public cloud while needing to stay within the confines of a VMware-based solution, these offerings can really help the economics make sense, even for enterprises, not just the t-shirt and jeans cloud-native types.

NetApp Enterprise Storage Announcements – February 2025

Posted on by

NetApp recently made some announcements about enhancements to its enterprise storage line of products. I thought I’d share a few notes here.

 

ASA A-Series

If you’re unfamiliar with the ASA line of devices, it’s NetApp’s all-flash SAN solution. There are a few models already available (see the data sheet here) and now there are three more A-series models: the ASA A50, ASA A30, and ASA A20.

[image courtesy of NetApp]

Major Hardware Innovations

There’s an integrated compression offload engine with Intel® QAT®1 (this is not available with the ASA A20), delivering the following benefits:

  • Next generation CPU architecture provides increased performance for resource-intensive tasks and processing
  • Always-on enhanced storage efficiency without impacting performance
  • Up to 160Gb/s data compression

It takes advantage of PCIe Gen 5, as well as DDR 5 Memory. According to NetApp, this delivers twice the clock speed for faster memory access and 50% more throughput for large data transfers. Additionally, there’s support for 64Gb Fibre Channel and NVMe/FC, as well as 100GbE and NVMe/TCP support. They use Titanium power supplies with a 95% efficiency rating.

Storage efficiency

You also get access to “always on, inline, data reduction”. There’s no cold data policy to manage, nothing for customers to configure and, according to NetApp, it’s easy to meet Storage Efficiency Guarantee ratios. Thanks to QAT, you’ll never need to choose between performance or efficiency.

 

New FAS and EF-Series systems

FAS50

The FAS50 delivers quite a punch in a small 2U form factor, with:

  • Optimised I/O flexibility;
  • Improved price/performance value;
  • Enabled for future security hardware offload; and
  • Released with ONTAP 9.16.1 GA.

[image courtesy of NetApp]

EF Series

NetApp has also announced the availability of new EF-Series arrays – the EF300C and EF600C.

[image courtesy of NetApp]

A few things to note with the EF300C and EF600C:

  • The default configuration is a single Dynamic Disk Pool (DDP) which is automatically created using all available drives for simplicity in management
  • There is support for 30TB or 60TB capacities (but by default there is no mixing of capacities in a shelf)
  • There is only support for QLC NVMe SSDs (No mixing of QLC or TLC NVMe SSDs allowed)
  • Available with a minimum of 12x up to a maximum of 24x QLC NVMe SSDs (No expansion shelf capability)

 

Thoughts

It’s been a minute since I wrote about a storage company’s product announcement. The news from NetApp piqued my interest, however, as it seems like the portfolio of products and options has developed into something broader than what NetApp was traditionally known for (and I know there’s even more news that was announced that I haven’t covered here). Whilst I talk a lot about how useful the cloud is in my day job, it’s hard to dispute that I/O (and storage in general) can still have a massive impact on the performance and usability of critical and not so critical applications alike. Additionally, having options in terms of scalability, performance, and transport mechanisms, is key to delivering the right storage platforms to the applications (and end users) that need them. But while I’ve dumped a lot of speeds and feeds into this article, ultimately the success of a storage company like NetApp is more about how the platforms can be managed, integrated with other systems, and upgraded from one version to the next.

If you’re running everything in one of the hyperscalers (or more than one, for that matter). you’re not going to be terribly interested in what NetApp is selling. Despite the fact that NetApp is doing some cool stuff with hyperscalers as well (that I’ll cover in a separate post). But a large percentage of the world’s critical workloads are still hosted on what we might term “traditional” storage appliances hosted in data centres across the globe and accessed and managed in a similar fashion to the way they were 5 or 10 years ago. But that doesn’t mean that companies like NetApp aren’t innovating. Indeed, looking at some of the specs and numbers being touted here, it’s easy to see why companies are sticking with the likes of NetApp when it comes to hosting enterprise workloads on enterprise storage. I don’t think the end of traditional storage is here by any stretch, and I’m pretty sure there’s more innovation to come.

Brisbane VMUG – February 2025

Posted on by

The February 2025 edition of the Brisbane VMUG meeting will be held on Tuesday 25th February at the NetApp office (Level 17, Central Plaza Two, 66 Eagle St, Brisbane) from 12:00 – 1:30pm. It’s sponsored by Netapp and promises to be a great lunch and learn session.

Here’s the agenda:

  • Wade Juppenlatz, Technical Partner Lead at NetApp, will be presenting ONTAP tools for VMware (OTV) integration and a dual site active/active configuration using vSphere HA and NetApp BlueXP.
  • Peter Hauck, Cloud Infrastructure Architect at VMware by Broadcom, will be presenting an overview of memory tiering and how it can help reduce hardware costs. He’ll cover off what capabilities and features you can expect to see in the production release of memory tiering in VCF 9 as well as how you can use the current tech preview version in vSphere 8 to get much more out of your home lab.

NetApp has gone to great lengths to make sure this will be a fun and informative session. You can find out more information and register for the event here. Also, if you’re interested in sponsoring one of these events, please get in touch with me and I can help make it happen.

Random Short Take #98

Posted on by

Welcome to Random Short Take #98. Some of these links have been in my queue for a little while, so apologies if it’s not as fresh as it could be. Let’s get random.

  • Let’s start off with a brilliant article from JB “Going tharn“. We build all these systems to get stuff done, and when it goes wrong it can go ever so wrong. To quote the article, “[t]hat is the terrible power of modern systems, I think. They make us alone, atomise us, and disconnect us from each other. They turn us tharn. They replace those human connections with a User-Platform relationship that feels remarkably similar to the old master-servant relationship in its power imbalance.” I haven’t read something that resonated with me as much as that in quite some time.
  • My friend Damo is heading off on esCarpade later this week, raising money for Camp Quality. If you have some of the folding stuff lying around I urge you to support him.
  • Which disk format? Howard Oakley asks (and answers) the question so I don’t have to ask it anymore.
  • Here are some of the announcements from NetApp Insight 2024.
  • I enjoyed Tom’s article “Semper Gumby“. It’s important to try and be as flexible as possible, even when you get old and crotchety like I am.
  • Preston has started “Preston’s Assorted musings (Episode 1?)” and I believe it’s already a series. Worth checking out if only for the fact that he puts some thought into it rather than just spraying links to random articles everywhere like I do.
  • Paolo put together a handy article on how to configure the Object First VSA as a Veeam Repository if you’re into that kind of thing.
  • Over at El Reg there’s an article on how your Smart TV sucks. And it’s tracking you. No surprises there, but look into blocking yours with a pi-hole if you can (or however you like to restrict access to things that shouldn’t be talking to the big, wide world).

Brisbane VMUG – October 2022

Posted on by

The October 2022 edition of the Brisbane VMUG meeting will be held on Wednesday 12th October at the Cube (QUT) from 5pm – 7pm. It’s sponsored by NetApp and promises to be a great afternoon.

Two’s Company, Three’s a Cloud – NetApp, VMware and AWS

NetApp has had a strategic relationship with VMware for over 20 years, and with AWS for over 10 years. Recently at VMware Explore we made a significant announcement about VMC support for NFS Datastores provided by the AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP service.

Come and learn about this exciting announcement and more on the benefits of NetApp with VMware Cloud. We will discuss architecture concepts, use cases and cover topics such as migration, data protection and disaster recovery as well as Hybrid Cloud configurations.

There will be a lucky door prize as well as a prize for best question on the night. Looking forward to see you there!

Wade Juppenlatz – Specialist Systems Engineer – QLD/NT

Chris (Gonzo) Gondek – Partner Technical Lead QLD/NT

 

PIZZA AND NETWORKING BREAK!

This will be followed by:

All the News from VMware Explore – (without the jet lag)

We will cover a variety of cloudy announcements from VMware Explore, including:

  • vSphere 8
  • vSAN 8
  • VMware Cloud on AWS
  • VMware Cloud Flex Storage
  • GCVE, OCVS, AVS
  • Cloud Universal
  • VMware Ransomware Recovery for Cloud DR

Dan Frith – Staff Solutions Architect – VMware Cloud on AWS, VMware

 

And we will be finishing off with:

Preparing for VMware Certifications

With the increase of position requirements in the last few years, certifications help you demonstrate your skills and move you a step forward on getting better jobs. In this Community Ssession we will help you understand how to prepare for a VMware certification exam and some useful tips you can use during the exam.

 

We will talk about:

  • Different types of exams
  • How to schedule an exam
  • Where to get material to study
  • Lessons learned from the field per type of exam

Francisco Fernandez Cardarelli – Senior Consultant (4 x VCIX)

 

Soft drinks and vBeers will be available throughout the evening! We look forward to seeing you there!

Doors open at 5pm. Please make your way to The Atrium, on Level 6.

You can find out more information and register for the event here. I hope to see you there. Also, if you’re interested in sponsoring one of these events, please get in touch with me and I can help make it happen.

VMware Cloud on AWS – Supplemental Storage – A Few Notes …

Posted on by

At VMware Explore 2022 in the US, VMware announced a number of new offerings for VMware Cloud on AWS, including something we’re calling “Supplemental Storage”. There are some great (official) posts that have already been published, so I won’t go through everything here. I thought it would be useful to provide some high-level details and cover some of the caveats that punters should be aware of.

 

The Problem

VMware Cloud on AWS has been around for just over 5 years now, and in that time it’s proven to be a popular platform for a variety of workloads, industry verticals, and organisations of all different sizes. However, one of the challenges that a hyper-converged architecture presents is that resource growth is generally linear (depending on the types of nodes you have available). In the case of VMware Cloud on AWS, we (now) have 3 node types available for use: the I3, I3en, and I4i. Each of these instances provides a fixed amount of CPU, RAM, and vSAN storage for use within your VMC cluster. So when your storage grows past a certain threshold (80%), you need to add an additional node. This is a longwinded way of saying that, even if you don’t need the additional CPU and RAM, you need to add it anyway. To address this challenge, VMware now offers what’s called “Supplemental Storage” for VMware Cloud on AWS. This is ostensibly external datastores presented to the VMC hosts over NFS. This comes in two flavours: FSx for NetApp ONTAP and VMware Cloud Flex Storage. I’ll cover this in a little more detail below.

[image courtesy of VMware]

 

Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP

The first cab off the rank is Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP (or FSxN to its friends). This one is ONTAP-like storage made available to your VMC environment as a native service. It’s fully customer managed, and VMware managed from a networking perspective.

[image courtesy of VMware]

There’s a 99.99% Availability SLA attached to the service. It’s based on NetApp ONTAP, and offers support for:

  • Multi-Tenancy
  • SnapMirror
  • FlexClone
​Note that it currently requires VMware Managed Transit Gateway (vTGW) for Multi-AZ deployment (the only deployment architecture currently supported), and can connect to multiple clusters and SDDCs for scale. You’ll need to be on SDDC version 1.20 (or greater) to leverage this service in your SDDC, and there is currently no support for attachment to stretched clusters. While you can only connect datastores to VMC hosts using NFSv3, there is support for connecting directly to guest VMs via other protocols. More information can be found in the FAQ here. There’s also a simulator you can access here that runs you through the onboarding process.

 

VMware Cloud Flex Storage

The other option for supplemental storage is VMware Cloud Flex Storage (sometimes referred to as VMC-FS). This is a datastore presented to your hosts over NFSv3.

Overview

VMware Cloud Flex Storage is:

  • A natively integrated cloud storage service for VMware Cloud on AWS that is fully managed by VMware;
  • Cost effective multi-cloud storage solution built on SCFS;
  • Delivered via a two-tier architecture for elasticity and performance (AWS S3 and local NVMe cache); and
  • Provides integrated Data-Management.

In short, VMware has taken a lot of the technology used in VMware Cloud Disaster Recovery (the result of the Datrium acquisition in 2020) and used it to deliver up to 400 TiB of storage per SDDC.

[image courtesy of VMware]
The intent of the solution, at this stage at least, is that it is only offered as a datastore for hosts via NFSv3, rather than other protocols directly to guests. There are some limitations around the supported topologies too, with stretched clusters not being currently supported. From a disaster recovery perspective, it’s important to note that VMware Cloud Flex Storage is currently only offered on a single-AZ basis (although the supporting components are spread across multiple Availability Zones), and there is also no support for VMware Cloud Disaster Recovery co-existence with this solution.

 

Thoughts
I’ve only been at VMware for a short period of time, but I’ve had numerous conversations with existing and potential VMware Cloud on AWS customers looking to solve their storage problems without necessarily putting everything on vSAN. There are plenty of reasons why you wouldn’t want to use vSAN for high capacity storage workloads, and I believe these two initial solutions go some ways to solving that issue. Many of the caveats that are wrapped around these two products at General Availability will be removed over time, and the traditional objections relating to VMware Cloud on AWS being not great at high-capacity, cost-effective storage will also have been removed.
Finally, if you’re an existing NetApp ONTAP customer, and were thinking about what you were going to do with that Petabyte of unstructured data you had lying about when you moved to VMware Cloud on AWS, or wanting to take advantage of the sweat equity you’ve poured into managing your ONTAP environment over the years, I think we’ve got you covered as well.

Random Short Take #73

Posted on by

Welcome to Random Short Take #73. Let’s get random.

Ransomware? More Like Ransom Everywhere …

Posted on by

Stupid title, but ransomware has been in the news quite a bit recently. I’ve had some tabs open in my browser for over twelve months with articles about ransomware that I found interesting. I thought it was time to share them and get this post out there. This isn’t comprehensive by any stretch, but rather it’s a list of a few things to look at when looking into anti-ransomware solutions, particularly for NAS environments.

 

It Kicked Him Right In The NAS

The way I see it (and I’m really not the world’s strongest security person), there are (at least) three approaches to NAS and ransomware concerns.

The Endpoint

This seems to be where most companies operate – addressing ransomware as it enters the organisation via the end users. There are a bunch of solutions out there that are designed to protect humans from themselves. But this approach doesn’t always help with alternative attack vectors and it’s only as good as the update processes you have in place to keep those endpoints updated. I’ve worked in a few shops where endpoint protection solutions were deployed and then inadvertently clobbered by system updates or users with too many privileges. The end result was that the systems didn’t do what they were meant to and there was much angst.

The NAS Itself

There are things you can do with NetApp solutions, for example, that are kind of interesting. Something like Stealthbits looks neat, and Varonis also uses FPolicy to get a similar result. Your mileage will vary with some of these solutions, and, again, it comes down to the ability to effectively ensure that these systems are doing what they say they will, when they will.

Data Protection

A number of the data protection vendors are talking about their ability to recover quickly from ransomware attacks. The capabilities vary, as they always do, but most of them have a solid handle on quick recovery once an infection is discovered. They can even help you discover that infection by analysing patterns in your data protection activities. For example, if a whole bunch of data changes overnight, it’s likely that you have a bit of a problem. But, some of the effectiveness of these solutions is limited by the frequency of data protection activity, and whether anyone is reading the alerts. The challenge here is that it’s a reactive approach, rather than something preventative. That said, companies like Rubrik are working hard to enhance its Radar capability into something a whole lot more interesting.

Other Things

Other things that can help limit your exposure to ransomware include adopting generally robust security practices across the board, monitoring all of your systems, and talking to your users about not clicking on unknown links in emails. Some of these things are easier to do than others.

 

Thoughts

I don’t think any of these solutions provide everything you need in isolation, but the challenge is going to be coming up with something that is supportable and, potentially, affordable. It would also be great if it works too. Ransomware is a problem, and becoming a bigger problem every day. I don’t want to sound like I’m selling you insurance, but it’s almost not a question of if, but when. But paying attention to some of the above points will help you on your way. Of course, sometimes Sod’s Law applies, and things will go badly for you no matter how well you think you’ve designed your systems. At that point, it’s going to be really important that you’ve setup your data protection systems correctly, otherwise you’re in for a tough time. Remember, it’s always worth thinking about what your data is worth to you when you’re evaluating the relative value of security and data protection solutions. This article from Chin-Fah had some interesting insights into the problem. And this article from Cohesity outlined a comprehensive approach to holistic cyber security. This article from Andrew over at Pure Storage did a great job of outlining some of the challenges faced by organisations when rolling out these systems. This list of NIST ransomware resources from Melissa is great. And if you’re looking for a useful resource on ransomware from VMware’s perspective, check out this site.