This is the second blog on Cisco UCS X-Series as part of a converged infrastructure solution with 100G Unified Fabric. This week it's FlashStack.

What is FlashStack?

The FlashStack solution is a validated, converged infrastructure developed jointly by Cisco and Pure Storage first announced in 2014. The solution offers a predesigned architecture that incorporates computing (UCS X-Series, UCS B-Series, and UCS C-Series), all flash storage from Pure, and networking to reduce IT risk by validating the architecture and helping ensure compatibility among the components. FlashStack is a great choice for virtualization, SQL, SAP HANA, containers, and other enterprise apps.

FlashStack with 100G Unified Fabric and UCS X-Series

Most recently we modernized FlashStack with UCS X-Series and 100G unified fabric and Pure Storage FlashArray//XL. Supporting both Ethernet, Fibre Channel, and NVMe choices on the same fabric, managed by Cisco Intersight, it brings a host of new capabilities that you'll see in the this two part video series.

Video 1:

In the first video, a high-available reference architecture is described, highlighting performance and latency capabilities of the overall solution when Pure Storage FlashArray//XL arrays are used with X-Series and 100G end-to end unified fabric design:

Video 2:

In the next video, we dig deeper into the visibility and orchestration of a FlashStack with the Pure Storage Intersight Connector. Intersight provides detailed information on all the elements of a FlashStack solution and has the capability to display capacity and performance metrics for Pure Storage arrays. In addition, the video highlight how Intersight Workload Optimizer (IWO) can be leveraged to manage and optimize a FlashStack solution, and how Intersight Cloud Orchestrator can be used to create and execute automated workflows to simplify and accelerate deployment:

Why FlashStack?

It's all about integration and validation. FlashStack helps minimize costly and time-consuming hardware integrations. It combines Cisco compute and networking with Pure Storage into a single solution so customers can quickly deploy infrastructure and workloads with less risk and overhead that scales non-disruptively. There are 44 current validated designs. You'll gain lower risk, higher ROI, increased productivity, and backward compatibility without rip and replace.

In June this year, we jointly announced FlashStack-as-a-service a software-defined hybrid cloud infrastructure integrating on-premises and multi-cloud landscapes. It is a pay-as-you-use flexible consumption model, holistically managed, with cloud like elasticity.  Intersight and Intersight Workload Optimizer continuously analyzes workload demand, resource consumption, resource costs, and policy constraints to help optimize usage.

What's next?

Next week, our last video blog in this series -using X-Series with GPUs for big data applications.

Resources 

• FlashStack with Cisco UCS X-Series and Cisco Intersight white paper
• FlashStack Virtual Server Infrastructure for End-to-End 100 Gigabit Design Guide
  • All Cisco Validated Designs for FlashStack
• More FlashStack blogs
• FlashStack website
• Cisco's FlashStack webpage
• Power Your Microsoft SQL Server Into the Future
• More FlashStack videos
• PNC's Digital Financial Services Journey
• All Cisco UCS X-Series resources
• Cisco Intersight
• Request a 1:1 Cisco Intersight demo
• Cisco DevNet GitHub repositories for Intersight
• All X-Series blogs
  • X-Series video blog#1 -Server deployment done right -Cisco UCS X-Series with Intersight
  • X-Series video blog#2 -VDI to GPU Accelerated VDI -Cisco UCS X-Series with X-Fabric Technology
  • X-Series video blog#3 -Automation with UCS X-Series leveraging Cisco Intersight and Ansible
  • X-Series video blog#4 -Easily deploy your hybrid cloud apps with UCS X-Series and deploying Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform
  • X-Series video blog#5 -Maximize your Oracle database performance with Cisco UCS X-Series
  • X-Series video blog#6 -Performance made simple with Cisco UCS X-Series powered by Intersight
  • X-Series video blog#7 -Cisco UCS X-Series -100G end-to-end networking
  • X-Series video blog#8 -Cisco UCS X-Series -100G Unified Fabric for storage
  • X-Series video blog#9 -FlexPod XCS powered by UCS X-Series and Intersight