A vSAN, or virtual storage area network, uses control and connectivity layers created by software to bring the benefits of virtualisation to advanced storage.
vSAN is a storage virtualisation technology developed by VMware. It is part of VMware's suite of virtualisation products and is used to pool disk space from multiple ESXi hosts into a single distributed shared datastore. This approach enables the centralized management of this storage space as if it were a single SAN.
Key features and benefits of vSAN include:
- Simplified storage management: vSAN simplifies the provisioning and management of storage resources, allowing for dynamic scaling and easy integration with VMware's ecosystem.
- High availability and scalability: It provides high availability for virtual machines by replicating data across multiple ESXi hosts. This ensures that data remains accessible even if one or more hosts fail.
- Cost efficiency: By utilizing the existing server storage, it can significantly reduce the total cost of ownership compared to traditional SAN solutions.
- Performance optimisation: vSAN uses caching and storage policies to optimise performance, which can be tailored to the needs of different workloads.
- Integration with VMware products: Being a VMware product, vSAN integrates seamlessly with other VMware solutions, providing a cohesive and compatible virtualisation environment.
- vSAN is particularly suitable for businesses that already use VMware virtualisation products and are looking to streamline their storage management and reduce costs associated with traditional storage solutions.
How Are vSANs Used?
Many organisations have adopted local area networks (LANs), virtualised workspaces, remote work technology, and data storage that may be dispersed across local storage, data centre, and edge computing deployments. Because of the widespread use of these complex solutions, IT professionals need a method to bring all these elements into a single system that allows access to this dispersed storage by many people.
How Does a vSAN Work?
A vSAN is dedicated software responsible for unification of and access to storage. A vSAN not only provides access but also can unify disparate storage instances—such as the cloud, on-premises storage, flash storage, tape drives, and traditional hard drives. The vSAN can then establish a network that allows customizable sharing of this storage by multiple users and by isolation of traffic based on parameters such as user, access level, or data source.
Depending on the vendor, a vSAN can run as a virtual storage appliance (VSA), a storage interface for a virtual machine, or as a basic user-mode application. If necessary, a vSAN can provide access to block, object, and file storage, translating and converting data as needed.
vSANs can be linked to one hypervisor or set up as hypervisor-agnostic. They can be deployed either in all-flash environments or in hybrid configuration, with flash as the caching layer and traditional hard drives used everywhere else. For network storage sharing, vSAN utilizes numerous protocols, such as Fibre Channel (FC), Internet Small Computer Systems Interface (iSCSI), Server Message Block (SMB), Network File System (NFS), and proprietary protocols.
What Are vSAN Policies?
vSAN policies are created by system operators to establish system and device requirements, and more importantly, to govern how and where data is accessible.
Advantages of vSAN vs. SAN
Now let’s look at some of the advantages vSANs provide compared to SANs. vSANs offer:
- Sharing: vSANs can provide access to more types of storage and make that storage available to more users.
- Resilience: Since a vSAN is configured independently for each user, a problem occurring for one user can be fixed with minimum disruption to other users. A vSAN can also increase resilience by allowing the creation of data redundancy where possible.
- Security: The independent configurations possible with a vSAN are also extremely helpful for security, data governance, and compliance. Users can be provided only the data they need and are entitled to view.
- Operability: A vSAN can be made to operate with low-end hardware such as x86 devices. It can also manage storage operations such as deduplication, backups, and compression.
- Performance: vSANs allow for the creation of rules that can distribute bandwidth and compute capacity according to need or priority. Performance-hungry or mission-critical applications benefit from more resources, while other applications won’t have dedicated resources that are not needed.
vSANs and Hyperconverged Infrastructure
vSANs are one of the basic building blocks of hyperconverged infrastructure, which is virtualisation of all hardware-defined computing elements into a single hypervisor-enabled system that can be run on any hardware, even commodity off-the-shelf hardware.
Conclusion
As the imperative for sustainable practices in data centre operations grows ever more pressing and the data deluge shows no signs of slowing, modular data centers stand out as a strategic asset for companies looking to stay competitive in a digitally driven marketplace. Organisations must pivot toward solutions that not only meet the computational demands of a data-driven future but also align with environmental goals.
Pure Storage integrates seamlessly with VMware's storage ecosystem, focusing on enhancing the vSphere environment through Virtual Volumes (vVols). Unlike vSAN, which is designed for internal storage, vVols caters to external storage, leveraging the advanced features of storage arrays like Pure Storage. Pure Storage's commitment to vVols allows for the integration of sophisticated storage capabilities directly into vSphere, offering enhanced control and efficiency at the virtual disk level. This partnership underscores Pure Storage's dedication to providing top-tier storage solutions within the VMware landscape.
