Mellanox is a proven solution enabler for high-performance computing (HPC). Its InfiniBand (IB)-based interconnects have been widely used in HPC clusters, including clustered storage systems. However, customers have often overlooked the fact that Mellanox is also an end-to-end fabric provider with high-quality, low-priced Ethernet-based products. Recently, Mellanox announced a new top-of-rack 10/40GbE switch with industry-leading density and industry-first PCIe 3.0-compliant network interface cards (NICs). These new products should help solidify Mellanox’s technical leadership in the highly competitive Ethernet fabric market. With more and more network storage systems offering support for iSCSI and Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) host connectivity, IDEAS expects Mellanox to play a more significant role in the storage network market, especially considering that Mellanox’s storage optimization technologies are already embedded in its network interconnect offerings.
The storage network market was traditionally described as the SAN switch market. A handful of players in this market now remain following a series of acquisitions, including Brocade (which acquired McData, which had acquired Computer Network Technology [CNT], which had acquired InRange Technologies), Cisco, and QLogic. “SAN” in the traditional sense meant FC-SAN, and these vendors are the major FC switch providers. In recent years, the definition of a SAN has expanded to include Ethernet-based fabrics, due to the proliferation of the iSCSI protocol. Some SANs are built solely on an Ethernet infrastructure; these are known as IP-SANs. FCoE support on 10GbE allows further convergence of FC-SAN and IP-SAN technologies.
Mellanox is well positioned to provide a converged network for both servers and storage. Mellanox ConnectX adapters offer stateless iSCSI offload as a standard feature. ConnectX adapters with Virtual Protocol Interconnect (VPI) support storage command encapsulations over IB fabric with protocols such as iSCSI Extensions for RDMA (iSER), FC over IB (FCoIB), and FCoE. VPI also provides I/O virtualization for VMware virtual machines. In addition, Mellanox offers Storage Accelerator (VSA) software, which can be installed on standard Linux servers or appliances to optimize storage performance with a high bandwidth network connection through I/O parallelization and prioritization. When Storage Accelerator (VSA) is installed on the server, the software can utilize high-speed local storage, such as flash- or RAM-based SSDs, as flash cache for performance acceleration. The Storage Accelerator (VSA) appliance supports iSCSI clients over Ethernet or IB, and iSER, but only with Linux clients. Multiple Storage Accelerator (VSA) appliances can be deployed in a cluster to scale up performance. These appliances, with high-speed local storage, can also be used as flash cache devices that provide network-based caching for the SAN. Customers that have standardized on iSCSI storage should definitely take a close look at Mellanox’s offerings.
Nevertheless, FC support from Mellanox is not as complete as support from traditional SAN switch vendors. Although Mellanox switches and NICs support the FCoE protocol, the network storage target can only consist of storage systems that natively support FCoE (some systems may support 10GbE but not FCoE). In order to convert FCoE to a regular FC connection, an FC Forwarder (FCF) is needed. McData, Cisco, and QLogic all offer some switch models with embedded FCF, so that a regular FC cable can be plugged into the switch (in fixed or configurable ports) and receive FC commands from FCoE clients. Mellanox switches do not provide embedded FCFs, that is, they provide no port connection for native FC storage targets. Note that Mellanox offers the BridgeX EN application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) for FCoE-to-FC conversion, which allows OEMs to produce FCFs. But Mellanox’s own BridgeX-based gateway products do not include an FCF model. (The Mellanox BX4000 gateway supported IB-to-FC or FCoE-to-FC conversion, but it seems the product is no longer offered.) For customers with FC infrastructure, or who require FC connectivity for storage replication or disaster recovery, switches with embedded FCF are the most convenient option. At least, customers would expect Mellanox to supply its own branded FCF solution.
IDEAS Bottom Line
The impact of Ethernet-based storage on the computing industry has been profound. The iSCSI protocol and network file protocols such as NFS and CIFS allow Ethernet to be the sole physical interconnect technology on a converged network that carries all the I/O traffic of LANs, WANs, SANs, and NAS installations. The increased use of Ethernet has driven up the volume of Ethernet-based products and accelerated the price declines of each new generation of Ethernet standards. Ethernet has made its way into storage networks and is threatening the future of FC. With 40GbE commoditizing within the next few years, IB might be at risk as well.
Mellanox’s success in the Ethernet market is not only critical for the company to keep up with its financial targets, it is also strategically vital to Mellanox’s long-term survival. The storage network market is a growing segment that Mellanox cannot afford to miss out on. Competition from traditional SAN vendors is stiff, because all of them are also in the Ethernet switch business and are providing more complete Ethernet/FC convergence solutions than Mellanox. Mellanox offers some unique storage acceleration solutions that differentiate it from other SAN switch vendors; however, flash-based performance acceleration solutions are widely available from major system and storage venders. Continuous innovation, along with cooperation from storage and system vendors, will be key for Mellanox to succeed in the storage network market. For example, Mellanox should enable more advanced VPI integration with network storage systems and enterprise storage management solutions.
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