UK firms reject all-flash storage arrays, claims survey

Despite the current hype and buzz around all-flash storage arrays, a recent survey found that most British businesses see little practical reason for deploying it.

The extremely high cost associated with all-flash arrays was cited by three-quarters (75%) of those surveyed as the single biggest barrier to deployment, should they consider it in the first place.

Meanwhile, almost three-quarters (73%) say they would still select a traditional hard disk drive (HDD) with SSD cache or hybrid (flash and HDD) storage solutions over a flash-only array. In fact, just 15 percent of those surveyed believe that an all-flash array is ideal for their business needs today.

Although over half (56%) had concerns about all-flash arrays being new and unproven, a far bigger concern was around the risks of consumer-grade flash being used in their business.
An overwhelming 99 percent of those surveyed said they would not permit an all-flash array using consumer-grade flash into their organisation.

Roger Walton, VP EMEA for X-IO, said: “The key point to note for all-flash vendors is the adamant refusal by most UK businesses to permit consumer-grade flash in their enterprise storage arrays. This approach might be one way to cheapen the price, but it seems no one plans to buy into that model. No matter much software is wrapped around consumer-grade flash, it’s still a major concern and adds far too much risk for enterprise environments.”

Aside from the cost and risks of deploying all-flash storage, the vast majority (90 percent) believe that their organisation doesn’t actually need the high performance promised by all-flash array vendors to justify such an investment. In fact, the survey found that the average most-intensive application peak was 54,000 IOPS, with just 10 percent of businesses peaking above 100,000 IOPS.

The survey was undertaken by independent research firm Vanson Bourne who interviewed senior IT decision-makers at 100 large enterprises across the UK. The purpose of the survey, which was commissioned by hybrid storage vendor X-IO Technologies, was to compare the actual adoption plans of all-flash arrays in the enterprise against the hype being promoted by all-flash array vendors.

Walton concludes: “Although the all-flash hype machine seems to be running at full steam, enterprise storage users are being eminently practical and realistic. While all-flash arrays do have their place in a few niche sectors, for most businesses it’s overkill and inappropriate.
Hybrid storage harnesses the advantages of flash and combines it with the proven ability of Hard Drives; this is the most desirable option for customers needing to balance cost, risk, and performance.”