Hitachi Vantara Updates Its Series 5000 Virtual Storage Platform

Hitachi Vantara has launched its latest virtual storage platform, the Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP) 5000 Series, which includes many performance improvements and a new Hitachi Ops Center management application.

Powered by Hitachi accelerated fabric, the new systems reportedly delivers 21 million IOPS and can scale to 69 petabytes in size, allowing partners and customers to build enterprise-class NVMe storage arrays for a wide range of uses.

Also included is an updated Hitachi storage virtualization operating system, according to the company.

The Hitachi VSP 5000 series is designed and built as a data storage foundation for a wide range of businesses with the ability to handle existing workloads while being ready to add future workloads from expanding multicloud and AI-driven environments, according to the company.

The systems include a new enterprise-class flash array for high performance and resilience using serial attached SCSI (SAS) architecture, NVMe and storage class memory (SCM).

The new Hitachi Ops Center software brings AI to infrastructure management and operations to help customers improve their IT decision-making and modernize resource delivery for improved infrastructure efficiency. The Ops Center software can automate up to 70% of customer tasks and can offer quicker and more accurate insights to diagnose system health and keep data operations running in top condition, according to Hitachi.

Running on the latest Hitachi storage virtualization operating system (SVOS), the storage systems are optimized for scale-out architectures and NVMe performance, while incorporating AI intelligence that adapts to changing conditions to optimize any workloads.

Customers can start with a small VSP 5000 configuration and grow it as needed.

Scott Webb, storage practice manager for Hitachi Vantara partner, World Wide Technology, said the new storage systems will help deliver needed storage for customers that will allow them to meet any workload requirements they may have with any application and infrastructure.

Another partner, Tom Frana, CEO of ViON, said that the new VSP 5000 platform hits square at the needs of customers who want to take advantage of virtualization and virtual storage. The new Hitachi Vantara VSP 5000 provides those desired capabilities, he said.

The VSP 5000 product line is available immediately.

451 Research’s Henry Baltazar

Henry Baltazar, an analyst with 451 Research, told Channel Futures that the latest VSP 5000 is Hitachi Vantara’s opportunity to set the bar high in the marketplace for performance and reliability.

“The new thing here is they increased their NVMe support for higher performance flash memory,” said Baltazar. “It’s an interesting thing they are doing. Others decided to go with all NVMe, but here they decided to go with NVMe and SAS,” which lets the vendor also use less expensive storage media to store data.

“For most workloads, it’s not like a workload is 100% hot,” said Baltazar. “So if you don’t need the extra performance, then why spend the extra money?”

The new management features will be helpful for partners and customers, he added.

“They need to improve operational efficiency for their customers and they are also helping their customers move to automation because that’s going to help them reduce their management burdens,” said Baltazar.