Violin Array Running Windows Server 2012 R2

Violin Memory, Inc. announced a high-performance, scale-out memory array platform that runs Microsoft Corp.‘s enterprise applications at the speed of memory.

The two companies have optimized Windows Server 2012 R2 for an all-memory persistent storage solution that sets standards of performance and economics for large-scale enterprise cloud deployments. With native support of Windows Server 2012 R2 and System Center 2012 R2, the scale-out memory array platform enables customers to deliver continuous and highly available enterprise application services in the cloud with ease and scale.

“The future of the datacenter is clearly memory,” said Don Basile, Violin CEO. “Violin’s scale-out memory platform for Windows is the ideal solution for running massive scale clouds.”

By running Windows applications natively on the platform, and leveraging the use of native Microsoft management tools, customers can create an enterprise cloud with no boundaries. Enterprise applications, including SQL Server, SharePoint, and Exchange along with Windows Server Hyper-V virtualization and Server Message Block (SMB) file services, benefit from direct access to persistent memory for lower latencies and performance. With the ability to scale out performance and capacity, the  memory array platform delivers an economical infrastructure for Microsoft-based enterprise clouds.

“Windows Server 2012 R2 delivers groundbreaking scalability to enable customers to evolve their virtualized and global-scale cloud environments,” said Chris Phillips, partner director PM at Microsoft. “By using Windows Server 2012 R2 with the Violin Memory scale-out memory array platform, our joint customers can achieve the scalability and performance requirements of their most demanding workloads in the cloud.”

According to Jim Handy, principal analyst at Objective Analysis, “The Violin announcement shows a new approach to computing that we are likely to see more of in the future, since it allows processing power to scale linearly with added hardware. A data center with a number of memory nodes with compute capacity should provide significant performance advantages over one in which data must be moved into and out of a number of servers.”

Each Violin array in the scale-out platform:

• Delivers more than 1 million IO/s
• Scales from 8TB to 64TB of memory capacity
• Delivers sub-second failover and
• Provides I/O access with latency measured in microseconds.