Dell Storage Software Innovations Bolster Cyber Resilience and IT Efficiency

Summary:

PowerStore security enhancements accelerate Zero Trust adoption to help customers better protect, prevent and respond to cyberattacks
It simplifies backup to multicloud environments to drive customer innovation with flexible storage automation
It delivers up to 60% more IO/s/watt ⁽¹⁾ with Energy Star configurations,⁽²⁾ making it the most energy efficient PowerStore system to date
Advancements across the Dell Storage portfolio span automation to improve cyber resilience, DevOps and system performance

Dell Technologies, Inc. advances software-driven innovation across its storage portfolio ⁽³⁾, driving increased cyber resiliency, energy efficiency and automation to power customers’ multicloud journeys.

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The company‘s commitment to software development has resulted in more than 2,000 storage portfolio advancements in the past 12 months across every category of the external storage industry. These advances are available at no additional cost to existing customers and are consumable through on-premises SaaS via Dell APEX.

“As data continues to pile up, and skilled IT talent often difficult to find, companies are finding themselves in a position to do more with less,” said Jeff Boudreau, president and GM, infrastructure solutions group, Dell. “We’re helping customers rise to this challenge by enabling them to make the most of their IT investments with storage software innovation that is more energy efficient, boosts productivity and strengthens cyber resiliency.”

PowerStore appliance

Built to meet most stringent security requirements across any industry
PowerStore, an all-flash storage array, is delivering increased security to help today’s leading businesses adopt a Zero Trust model – a security architecture that provides continuous verification of users and resources to ensure the authorization of only known entities and actions.

Through PowerStore’s security software enhancements, the company is helping customers accelerate Zero Trust adoption to better protect, prevent and respond to cyberattacks.

Advancements include:

STIG-hardening – Security Technical Implementation Guides (STIGs) meet the configuration standards as defined by the U.S. federal government and the U.S. Department of Defense.⁽⁴⁾ STIG hardening adds to PowerStore’s adherence with the NIST Cyber Security Framework standard, which is required for U.S. federal networks and other government entities WW.
Secure and immutable snapshots – Prevents unauthorized deleting or modifying of snapshots before their expiration date.
Streamlined file permissions – Allows storage administrators to manage access directly from PowerStore to respond quickly to security threats.
Increased file resiliency – Up to 4x more mounted snapshots per system,⁽⁵⁾ giving users more protection points for granular recovery if needed.
Multi-factor authentication – Protects administrative access to PowerStore by requiring increased verification of a user’s identity.

Helps customers drive increased productivity while keeping costs down
The PowerStore software automation and multicloud advancements help customers make the most of their existing IT investments while keeping operational and energy costs down.

These PowerStore features include:

PowerProtect native integration – Organizations now have increased simplicity and choice driving their multicloud data protection strategies with convenient backup to the cloud capability through PowerStore’s deeper integration into Dell’s physical and software-defined data protection solutions. Backups can be configured in less than two minutes,⁽⁶⁾ directly from the PowerStore user interface, allowing customers to easily take advantage of PowerProtect appliances with up to 65:1 data reduction,⁽⁷⁾ DD Boost technology and other capabilities. The solution can enable cost-effective cloud archiving, reducing on-premises capacity requirements which can help reduce power and cooling costs.
DevOps workflow enhancements – Integrations with Ansible and Terraform and new application mobility capabilities with Dell Container Storage Modules help PowerStore customers accelerate innovation with flexible storage automation. By supporting these open source solutions, PowerStore gives DevOps workers easy-to-use storage automation tools and the ability to build repeatable, automated processes across diverse environments to provision storage without low-level coding or help desk support.

PowerStore delivers up to 60% more IO/s per watt,⁽¹⁾ available with Energy Star certified configurations,⁽²⁾ providing increases in both density and performance per watt as the most energy efficient PowerStore system to date. With this advancement, the company is addressing the increased need for energy efficiency and sustainability, one of the most important criteria for IT buying decisions according to a recent IDC survey.⁽⁸⁾

“With Dell PowerStore’s compression technology, we reduced our old storage area network from as much as 20 systems, down to 2 – a 90% reduction in our footprint,” said Nathan Young, IT director, Maricopa County Recorder’s Office. “As a result, PowerStore has improved our energy efficiency while allowing us to innovate to meet changing demands from constituents and the increased expectations of our staff.“

Dell ramps up software-driven storage innovation
In addition to PowerStore, software innovations address a range of advancements across the the company’s storage portfolio:

PowerMax, a world’s most secure, mission-critical storage,⁽⁹⁾ strengthens cybersecurity by enabling an operational airgap to allow customers to expedite recovery of compromised production data following a cyberattack.
PowerFlex, firm‘s software-defined infrastructure, speeds modernization with enhanced NVMe/TCP and security.
ObjectScale, company’s software-defined object-storage platform, introduces faster enterprise S3 object storage performance⁽¹⁰⁾ with a simpler deployment and support experience.
CloudIQ, AIOps software, extends its AI/ML-driven performance and capacity analytics and VMware integration to simplify and accelerate IT and DevOps.
Unity XT, flexible hybrid storage platform, increases Ansible support to enhance storage automation, helping customers lower costs, reduce errors and increase productivity.

Availability:

PowerStore and ObjectScale advancements will be globally available in June 2023.
PowerMax, CloudIQ and Unity XT capabilities are globally available.
PowerFlex advancements will be globally available in 3Q23.

(1) Based on Dell analysis comparing maximum Ios/Watt for PowerStore 1200 base appliance configurations with PowerStoreOS 3.0 vs. PowerStore 1000 base appliance configuration with PowerStoreOS 2.0. Actual results vary.
(2) Energy Star configurations available in PowerStore 500 and 1000.
(3) IDC WW Quarterly Enterprise Storage Systems Tracker, 2022 Q4, March 9, 2023 – Vendor Revenue.
(4) PowerStore has the stringent security hardened requirements for usage in the US Federal Government. With PowerStoreOS 3.5 software or higher, the platform is STIG-compliant and ready for DoDIN approved product lists (APL) submission.
(5) Based on comparing file capabilities for PowerStoreOS 3.0 to PowerStoreOS 3.5 for PowerStore 3200, 5X00, 7000 and 9200.
(6) Based on Dell analysis, March 2023.
(7) Logical capacity based on up to 50x de-dupe (DD3300) and typically 65X de-dupe (DD6400, DD6900, DD9400, DD9900) based on additional hardware-assisted data compression of typically 30% more logical capacity per TB.
(8) IDC PlanScape: Adopting Circular Economy Principles to Support Digital Infrastructure Sustainability Goals, Doc #US49347122, July 2022.
(9) Based on Dell internal analysis of cybersecurity capabilities of Dell PowerMax versus cybersecurity capabilities of competitive mainstream arrays supporting open systems and mainframe storage, April 2023.
(10) Based on Dell analysis compared to ObjectScale version 1.0, April 2023. Actual results will vary.