Toshiba Memory America, Inc. (TMA), the U.S.-based subsidiary of Toshiba Memory Corporation, today announced that its newly released PM5 Series of 12Gb/s (gigabits per second) enterprise SAS SSDs has earned VMware vSAN 6.7 certification. This certification enables TMA's flash-based PM5 storage devices to be shared across connected hosts in a VMware vSphere cluster. With the vSAN 6.7 certification, users can pool PM5 Series SSDs together in a single, distributed shared data store. This allows users to define the storage capabilities required (such as performance, capacity and availability) for each connected virtual machine (VM) within the VMware vSAN cluster. These capabilities not only further hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) options in virtual environments, but also ensure that storage policies are administered and maintained within the PM5 Series with the utmost vSAN compatibility.

The certification of the PM5 Series enables VMware vSAN support for both hybrid and all-flash configurations using a two-tier storage architecture (capacity tier and cache tier). All write operations are sent to the cache tier and are subsequently de-staged to the capacity tier over time. When a PM5 Series SSD is deployed within a hybrid configuration, its cache tier is used as both a read and write cache, keeping hot data to improve performance. In an all-flash configuration, 100 percent of the cache tier is used for the write buffer. Given the benefits of tiered storage, PM5 Series SSDs are capable of meeting the demanding requirements of both enterprise and data center customers.Built with Toshiba Memory Corporation's 64-layer BiCS FLASH TLC (3-bit-per-cell) 3D flash memory, the PM5 Series offers up to 15.36 terabyte1 (TB) capacities in a 2.5-inch form factor2, and supports a full range of endurance and capacity ranges. It also utilizes the industry's first3 MultiLink SAS architecture, which delivers the fastest4 SAS SSD sequential performance to date5. In addition, PM5 Series SSDs support multi-stream write technology - a feature that intelligently manages and groups data types together to minimize write amplification and garbage collection. This translates into reduced latency, improved endurance, increased performance, and better Quality of Service (QoS).

"We are pleased to collaborate closely with Toshiba Memory America to jointly certify flash innovations for the fast-growing hyper-converged infrastructure market," said Lee Caswell, vice president products, Storage and Availability Business Unit, VMware. "Now that database applications represent the top workload for VMware vSAN, flash performance is critical. Customers looking for proven compatibility and interoperability can turn to Toshiba Memory's PM5 12Gb/s SAS SSDs."

"Toshiba Memory enterprise SSDs are built to withstand the most demanding performance and reliability needs of mission-critical applications," said Alvaro Toledo, vice president of SSD marketing and product planning, Toshiba Memory America, Inc. "Working directly with VMware to achieve certification for our PM5 SAS SSDs is key to providing peace of mind to customers utilizing a vSAN solution."

The PM5 Series of 12Gb/s SAS SSDs with VMware vSAN 6.7 and VMware ESXi 6.7 certification is now shipping. Available options include customized server OEM models also approved for vSAN all-flash capacity tier and caching tier, as well as hybrid caching tier implementations.