WHITE PAPER
EMC Launches VSPEX BLUE for VMware EVO:RAIL
Hyperconverged Systems with Unique Feature Set
Enabling IT Transformation
Sponsored by: EMC
Eric Burgener
Eric Sheppard
February 2015
Laura DuBois
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Today's IT leaders are faced with a decision: run the status quo or transform the IT infrastructure.
Facing pressure to align IT with corporate business objectives while managing to constrained budgets
and limited resources, IT executives must develop transformation strategies to succeed. IDC research
suggests that ongoing deployment and use of disaggregated IT resources increase capital and
management costs and perpetuate the individual silos of infrastructure that can stymie agility, scale,
and automation. However, converged and hyperconverged systems that integrate compute, storage,
and network services offer a fundamental shift in how IT leaders procure, deploy, manage, and extend
IT resources to meet tomorrow's operational and business demands.
Hyperconverged solutions, which address both business and IT resource challenges, provide the
performance, provisioning, and scale-out attributes to meet escalating business demands, while the
automation, ease-of-use, and orchestration characteristics ensure resource optimization and efficiency.
With an eye toward IT transformation, IT leaders are leveraging hyperconverged systems as one
approach in their arsenal to satisfy increasingly stringent business imperatives while achieving resource
and budgetary objectives. This white paper explains the differences between reference architectures,
integrated systems, and hyperconverged solutions such as EMC's VSPEX BLUE based on the VMware
EVO:RAIL software. The document offers an overview of EMC's VSPEX BLUE and the unique set of
features it delivers compared with other hyperconverged systems available on the market today.
February 2015, IDC #253751
SITUATION OVERVIEW
The IT infrastructure market is on a path of rapid evolution and consolidation. Customer priorities,
driven by the need to keep pace with business agility, have shifted from a focus on silos of compute,
networking, or storage infrastructure to a broader set of requirements around cloud computing,
application modernization, and workload management. As a result, vendors have been forced to
innovate and expand their product portfolios. One area of such innovation has been in the
convergence and integration of compute and storage services so that they run adjacent to each other
on the same physical hardware. Increasingly, the ability for compute, storage, and network software to
be decoupled from the underlying infrastructure and run on industry-standard x86 servers has ushered
in the era of software-defined infrastructure. And as more workloads continue to be run on virtual
infrastructure, the running of compute and storage functions on a common set of physical resources is
a natural outcome in the evolution of a software-defined infrastructure.
Today, hyperconverged infrastructure systems natively collapse core compute, storage, and
networking functions into a single software solution or appliance. The new hyperconverged system
comprises a distributed software stack that runs on a single node or multiple nodes that constitute a
cluster. Each node in the cluster runs the same hyperconverged software stack, which includes a
distributed file system or object store and a hypervisor stack that bootstraps the hardware and
provides abstraction of physical resources such as CPU, memory, and disk as well as cluster
management functionality. The nodes in the hyperconverged cluster communicate over a built-in
network (via an Ethernet or InfiniBand switch) or plug in to a customer-provided back-end network.
The architectural differences between a hyperconverged system and a converged or integrated system
are significant. As shown in Table 1, integrated systems provide autonomous compute, storage, and
networking systems integrated at the factory by a vendor or reseller. Conversely, hyperconverged
systems integrate compute and storage functions into a single software stack running on a single node
or a cluster of nodes. A hyperconverged system includes a native distributed file system/object store,
while an integrated system leverages the file-based storage attributes of its autonomous storage array.
A hyperconverged software stack natively enables workload adjacency, containerization, and
hardware abstraction. In comparison, integrated systems include separate resource components
responsible for discrete services. Last, with integrated systems, all required networking is included to
connect the separate server and storage components. With hyperconvergence, an optional Ethernet
switch connects the compute and storage layers together but also provides scale-out and/or highavailability capabilities. As a result, IDC views hyperconverged systems as a revolutionary break from
converged or integrated systems and their predecessor reference architectures.
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TABLE 1
Descriptions of Hyperconverged Systems, Integrated Systems, and
Reference Architectures
Hyperconverged Systems
(Excluding Software Only)
Integrated Infrastructure
Systems
Certified Multivendor
Reference Architectures
Overview
Single SKU product or
appliance with a full
development life cycle
(i.e., VSPEX BLUE or other
EVO:RAIL offerings).
Pre-integrated, vendorcertified solution sold as a
system (i.e., VCE's Vblock).
Solution built with autonomous
systems from multiple
technology vendors; uses a
highly prescriptive framework
and configuration templates.
IT components
Use of native, server-based
storage, compute, and
networking functions; storage
and compute functions run on
a single node (or a cluster of
nodes, each offering compute
and storage).
Use of independent and
autonomous, best-of-breed
servers, storage, and
networking components, all of
which are connected through
external networks.
Use of independent and
autonomous, best-of-breed
servers, storage, and
networking components, all of
which are connected through
external networks.
Responsible for
pre-integration
Not applicable —
Hyperconverged systems are
delivered as appliances and
do not rely on pre-integration.
IT vendor — IT vendor is
responsible for pre-integration.
Partner — Certified partners
handle most or all aspects of
pre-integration and fulfillment.
New intellectual
property
A hyperconverged software
stack runs on each node,
responsible for compute, data
organization, persistence,
containerization, and
hardware abstraction services.
Orchestration and integrated
management of different
components or systems.
Not applicable —
Configurations are defined
and configured using only
pre-existing products.
Service and support
model
Support is typically handled by
a single IT vendor.
Support is handled by a single
IT vendor.
Support is provided by vendors
and channel partners in a highly
collaborative manner.
Source: IDC, 2015
Hyperconverged Adoption Drivers and Benefits
The hyperconverged market represents a nascent but rapidly expanding and transformative portion of
the integrated systems space. As with other evolutionary technologies, sales of hyperconverged
systems are set to grow at triple-digit rates through the next year as users become more familiar with
the many benefits these solutions afford. IDC's informal estimates indicate that the revenue growth
rate of the hyperconverged market in 2014 was 150% — compared with an overall IT spending growth
rate of 3–4% for the same period. Increased adoption within this market is tied to the ability of
hyperconverged systems to attract a diverse set of organizations looking to leverage the technology
across a broad set of use cases.
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Many midsize organizations are deploying hyperconverged systems as the core infrastructure
intended to support their highly virtualized general-purpose applications. Larger organizations, on the
other hand, have standardized on the technology within remote/branch offices where capex savings
have a multiplying effect. The self-contained nature of hyperconverged systems (i.e., compute,
storage, and networking purchased, managed, and supported as a single node) also makes them
attractive at the department level where limited budgets and skills are important drivers of
infrastructure investments. Hyperconverged systems have also proven to be very attractive solutions
for virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) where the latency and costs associated with storage area
networks (SANs) can be eliminated.
Not surprisingly, most of the use cases listed previously align with a recent IDC survey of 300 users of
integrated systems to uncover (among other things) the reasons companies turn to these solutions.
According to IDC Integrated Systems: End-User Survey Report, 2014 (IDC #251695, September
2014), the primary challenges our respondents were looking to address through the deployment of
integrated systems were:

Improving resource utilization and capital spending

Improving IT staff productivity

Enabling disaster recovery/high-availability capabilities

Ensuring business agility and IT credibility
The transformative benefits of hyperconverged systems are as numerous as the use cases they
support. Perhaps the biggest benefit can be found through reduced capital costs. The first order of
capital cost savings comes from the collapsing of traditional compute, storage, and networking
equipment into a single, highly virtualized node built with industry-standard Intel x86 systems.
Hyperconverged systems are normally deployed as a cluster of nodes, each of which will host
compute and storage workloads without the need for dedicated storage networking equipment.
Thus all of the infrastructure required for an expensive (and complex) storage area network can be
condensed into an inexpensive set of nodes whose resources can be pooled together to efficiently
support all storage and compute workloads.
Capital cost savings don't stop there, however. Organizations looking to better manage their
infrastructure budgets can expect the modular, scale-out nature of hyperconverged systems to help
them greatly reduce the need to overprovision resources. Customers buy only the nodes required at
the time of initial deployment and scale later as needed. All nodes can have varying configurations
within a cluster, thus providing additional flexibility. The scale-out, clustered nature of hyperconverged
systems also ensures that performance needs are met as workloads grow because each node added
to a cluster contributes its resources to the broader pool of resources, which can be shared and
rebalanced as needed among nodes. Hyperconverged systems provide considerable operational
benefits by simplifying deployment and centralizing resource administration under a single integrated
management interface.
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EMC's VSPEX BLUE
With the trend in virtual infrastructure sales moving toward easy-to-deploy integrated solutions based on
industry-standard hardware, EMC has taken a further step in that direction with VSPEX BLUE, an
offering that provides benefits for both channel partners and end users. VSPEX BLUE is an
EMC-branded hyperconverged system based on intellectual property (IP) from both VMware and EMC.
VSPEX BLUE software runs on industry-standard Intel x86 hardware and includes value-added software
and services that differentiate it from offerings from EVO:RAIL partners such as HP, Dell, NetApp,
Supermicro, Fujitsu, and others.
At the core of VSPEX BLUE is EVO:RAIL, a hyperconverged offering that combines VMware compute,
networking, and storage resources into a simple, easy-to-deploy appliance. It includes VMware Virtual
SAN (VSAN), vCenter Log Insight, vSphere Enterprise Plus, vCenter Server, and the EVO:RAIL
management engine to provide common management across the hardware and software of the
EVO:RAIL solution. EVO:RAIL is a software platform that is specific to vSphere environments.
VSPEX BLUE also includes the EMC platform definition based on industry-standard Intel Xeon
processor–based x86 servers. The platform is an EMC-designed server used in many other EMC
products as well and built to EMC specification. VSPEX BLUE is available in two 2U/four-node
appliance configurations: a standard node that includes 128GB RAM and a performance node that
includes 192GB RAM. SSD and HDD components are included in both models. At initial release,
customers will be able to scale up to four (4) VSPEX BLUE nodes, although EMC expects to increase
the node count later in 2015.
What set VSPEX BLUE apart, however, are the additional value-added software and services — all of
which are based on EMC intellectual property — that are included with the product. VSPEX BLUE
includes VMware vSphere Data Protection Advanced with Data Domain Integration, EMC RecoverPoint
for Virtual Machines (VMs), EMC CloudArray, EMC Secure Remote Services (ESRS), and the
VSPEX BLUE Manager. The VSPEX BLUE Manager not only seamlessly integrates support for Web
services, software catalog management, and nondisruptive automated software updates but also
extends the EVO:RAIL appliance management experience. The VSPEX BLUE Manager includes the
VSPEX BLUE Market, the industry's first one-stop marketplace to download value-added software and
purchase upgrades and appliances from EMC and its ecosystem partners. The entire offering is covered
by the same comprehensive, enterprise-class 24 x 7 support offering that EMC provides all its
customers. VSPEX BLUE is a vertically integrated hyperconverged infrastructure system, purchasable
as a single all-inclusive product; manageable from a single interface that enables configuration,
management, and maintenance for all elements (including EMC software); and supported as a single
integrated product worldwide directly by EMC.
VSPEX BLUE Benefits
VSPEX BLUE is an enabler of IT transformation. The product provides a highly available, unified
storage offering that scales linearly, includes integrated data protection, and can be easily extended to
cloud-based environments. Designed for multitenant settings, VSPEX BLUE is capable of efficiently
hosting multiple computing workloads and includes the quality-of-service capabilities in vSphere to
ensure that even in densely consolidated environments, applications get the performance they need,
regardless of what else is going on in the cluster.
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The two key value propositions to hyperconverged offerings in general are ease of deployment and
cost-effectiveness, and VSPEX BLUE delivers on both fronts. Initial deployment is simple and
automated. Policy-based management makes repetitive operations such as provisioning and
maintenance fast and reliable. The scale-out architecture ensures simple, granular, and cost-efficient
expansion, and onboard automation ensures that, as new resources are added, the workload is
transparently rebalanced. Compute, storage, and networking resources are managed as shared pools
across all nodes, supporting the agile allocation and reclamation of resources that are needed in
today's computing environments.
VSPEX BLUE Differentiators
As defined, VSPEX BLUE is clearly differentiated from other EVO:RAIL offerings as well as other
VSAN OEMs (Cisco, IBM) and hyperconverged start-ups such as Nutanix and SimpliVity. First,
VSPEX is based on vSphere and VSAN, a distributed storage operating environment that provides
proven storage management functionality such as thin provisioning, snapshots, clones, and encryption
and delivers efficient and intuitive VM-level granularity for all storage operations. Pure HDD-based
configurations are supported, as are hybrid configurations that use SSD as a read/write caching layer
for added performance. VSPEX BLUE nodes can be managed using all the native functionality of
vSphere that is included as part of vSphere Enterprise Plus.
Given that VSPEX BLUE always uses vSphere and the same storage software stack, EMC created
a VSPEX BLUE Manager that goes beyond the capabilities of the EVO:RAIL manager in both
management scope and automation. EMC's VSPEX BLUE continues to break new ground with the
VSPEX BLUE Market. With the VSPEX BLUE Market, IT has, for the first time, a one-stop marketplace
to download value-added software and purchase upgrades and appliances from EMC and its
ecosystem partners to quickly and easily meet ever-changing business demands.
With EVO:RAIL, the standard installation and setup process that would normally include in excess of
200 steps is almost entirely automated — administrators just need to provide some network information
up front, and the system configures itself in roughly 15 minutes and is then ready for application
deployment. VMware utilities such as Distributed Resource Scheduler are used to make node addition,
deletion, or reconfiguration nondisruptive and work in conjunction with the VSPEX BLUE Manager to
perform rolling updates automatically, without impacting application availability. Predefined VM
templates make provisioning a simple and very reliable operation, even for new administrators.
VMware High Availability makes VMs highly available with a single click during provisioning
operations. And more experienced administrators can easily move from the VSPEX BLUE Manager, a
vSphere Web client–based interface, directly to the vCenter console to access the full power of the
native VMware environment.
Second, VSPEX BLUE includes best-of-breed data protection software that covers both local and remote
recovery requirements. VMware Data Protection Advanced uses Avamar's source-based deduplication
technology and delivers efficient agentless image backup, replication, and restore; individual disk
backup; variable-length block-based deduplication; changed block tracking restore; and file-level
recovery. It supports up to 8TB of data per virtual appliance; provides additional advanced applicationspecific features through agents for Microsoft SQL Server, Exchange, and SharePoint; and includes
EMC's Data Domain best-of-breed backup solution. RecoverPoint for VMs is also included, delivering
advanced disaster recovery functionality such as continuous synchronous and asynchronous replication
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to meet stringent recovery point objective (RPO) requirements, consistency groups, and WAN efficiency
in a very scalable, virtual appliance–based solution that supports heterogeneous storage hardware.
EMC CloudArray is also included, providing simple, easy creation of hybrid cloud environments that offer
cost-effective cloud-based storage for inactive data and offsite protection.
Finally, with the included support package, VSPEX BLUE addresses a concern many enterprises have
with service and support on other hyperconverged platforms. ESRS allows EMC to actively monitor
deployed systems, leveraging predictive diagnostics and extremely rapid response to deliver up to a
15% higher level of availability than in systems where ESRS is not enabled. For other EMC products,
the use of ESRS results in 15% higher availability and 5x faster time to resolution. Regardless of
where the VSPEX BLUE solution is purchased, support is provided directly by EMC on a worldwide
basis. Support is not complicated by triage between multiple vendors — all the infrastructure software in
VSPEX BLUE comes from either EMC or VMware (one of its federated companies), ensuring the
accountability to get issues resolved quickly and definitively.
For the benefit of channel partners, EMC has materially extended the value of VSAN and EVO:RAIL,
offering additional IP in VSPEX BLUE that will align with customer needs. Further, VSPEX BLUE is
optimized for partner value, delivering higher partner margins on a high-volume product. VSPEX BLUE
is appropriate for a broad range of midmarket customers and workloads across commercial companies
as well as service providers. Workload and environmental targets include general-purpose virtual
infrastructure, VDI, remote office and branch office settings, and private hybrid cloud configurations.
Deployment of the entire distributed software stack is automated, offloading the partner while
delivering extremely rapid time to value for purchasers. It is simple to purchase because all of it comes
from EMC under a single SKU, and the support is provided directly from EMC. Channel partners
predisclosed on VSPEX BLUE prior to announcement indicated that this new offering would
differentiate them from other competitors in the hyperconverged space, create larger deals, strengthen
strategic relationships with customers, and generate higher margins.
CHALLENGES/OPPORTUNITIES
The challenge for most IT leadership is in driving change. This change can be in IT processes, the
technology used, and/or the people responsible for the change. Revolutionary rather than evolutionary
technology shifts such as hyperconvergence can mean the most change. And change in any domain
or discipline can be hard to navigate. However, it is often with the most revolutionary change that the
most material benefits are realized. IT leaders considering transformation strategies should evaluate
how they can leverage hyperconverged systems to realize the most material benefits with the least
disruption to people, process, and technology. For these reasons, use cases such as departmental IT,
end-user computing/VDI, new applications, test/dev, and remote/branch offices are optimal initial
deployment scenarios. Further, customers considering VSAN or EVO:RAIL offerings will find many
options available in the market. Most of these offerings will look the same, with little differentiation.
However, as outlined in this white paper, EMC's VSPEX BLUE appliance is highly differentiated and
provides a compelling feature set that extends the value of the core VSAN and EVO:RAIL capabilities.
This provides customers and EMC with an opportunity for the successful installation, deployment, and
ongoing management of a transformative, hyperconverged solution that affords benefits for business
and IT alike.
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CONCLUSION
IT leaders understand that transformation is necessary to keep pace with changing business demands.
The era of cloud computing, mobility, social media, and big data/analytics is driving a massive amount
of innovation and opportunity. Aligning IT with these new business imperatives is mandatory for nextgeneration IT organizations. IDC research highlights that more firms are deploying hyperconverged
solutions to not only keep up with business objectives but also satisfy budget and operational
demands. EMC's VSPEX BLUE hyperconverged solution not only offers a datacenter infrastructure
model for the future but also includes unique feature sets that distinguish it from other alternatives on
the market. Based on the product's differentiation and capabilities, IDC recommends that users
evaluate EMC's VSPEX BLUE.
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About IDC
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