Nimble Storage Adds to Flash Array Lineup

Flash storage solutions company Nimble Storage (NMBK) recently announced several upgrades to its CS-Series arrays with the introduction of the CS300 and CS500 families. The new arrays will leverage Nimble’s Adaptive Flash CPU-driven architecture and Intel’s latest high-performance CPU architecture to deliver 50 percent more performance than the company’s previous product families, according to the company.

With the Adaptive Flash platform, enterprises will be able to scale performance and capacity independently, according to Nimble. Both the new CS300 and CS500 can also be combined with Nimble’s All-Flash Shelf, giving users support for up to 10TB of flash in a scale-out cluster. According to Nimble, the adaptive flash platform helps eliminate performance and capacity tradeoffs by providing the performance of a typical flash-only array combined with the capacity of a hybrid array.

“We strive to create a consistent enterprise-class experience across our entire product line,“ said Ajay Singh, vice president of Product Management at Nimble Storage, in a statement. “We have developed a platform that adapts as customers consolidate multiple types of workloads with varying performance and capacity demands. The introduction of the Sandy Bridge CPU architecture into our mainstream products expands our ability to address the needs of our customers.”

Both the CS300 and the CS500 are currently available, in addition to the company’s existing CS700 series arrays. The two new families will offer 10Gbase-T, GbE and GbE SFP+ Networking connectivity as well as the ability to interchange connectivity in the future. Nimble is also offering a new configure-to-order system, which will allow customers to choose specific network configurations, flash and drive capacity for their workloads.

The release should also allow VARs to profit by playing up the arrays’ “best of both worlds” aspect, effectively giving customers the ability to combine the strongest aspects of all-flash and hybrid array setups for their enterprise storage needs.