NetApp E-series is simply optimized for sequential I/O

Hey Chris, D from NetApp here...

Regarding your comment: "El Reg's understanding is that FAS ONTAP arrays do not have the sheer data access speed needed by such heavy and scale-out filer workloads."

Far from it - the ONTAP arrays have plenty of speed, but the Engenio-based E5460, for the money, pretty much smokes anything out there for sequential I/O. Note the "for the money".

I think there are faster boxes for sequential I/O than the E5460 but not at that density and cost, which is what makes it compelling.

I'm so misunderstood :)

We agree in general. The more "stuff" an array does, the more overhead there can be for some operations.

The simpler an array is, the easier it is to do some operations.

It's all a matter of tradeoffs, as the vendors that hitherto had "simple" arrays now realize how difficult it is to maintain high performance and add all the "stuff". Notice all the performance caveats from a certain large storage vendor when someone wants to implement autotiered storage pools with thin provisioning.

My statement remains, let me clarify:

You can get high sequential speeds out of FAS but it will cost a lot more to get them than doing it with Engenio.

And indeed that's one of the reasons we bought Engenio. A lot of environments don't need the extra "stuff" FAS has to offer, and just need a simpler box that is less expensive and can read/write sequentially very very quickly.

And, as a counterpoint, I still maintain that, given the amount of "stuff" FAS can do, the performance is unmatched.

It all depends on what you're trying to do.