Last week news quickly spread that the EMC XtremIO 3.0 update will be what's politely called a disruptive update (DU). What this means is the changes are so fundamental to how the flash arrays operate, that all data will be lost when upgrading to 3.0. All prior updates, the most recent being XtremIO 2.4, were on the other hand non-disruptive updates (NDU) meaning they could be done in-place with no damage to data. As a refresher, XtremIO 3.0 is due for GA this month and brings many improvements including online data compression, performance boost and increased scalability. For XtremIO customers, these are welcome enhancements but there's a cost. EMC had to make material changes to the way data is structured on the arrays, which is the core reason the DU is required for 3.0. For all the excitement that has spread about this update via Twitter, enthusiast blogs and XtremIO competitors, one fact remains; the online vitriol is largely one-way. XtremIO customers don't seem to care all that much about the update being disruptive.
Last week news quickly spread that the EMC XtremIO 3.0 update will be what's politely called a disruptive update (DU). What this means is the changes are so fundamental to how the flash arrays operate, that all data will be lost when upgrading to 3.0. All prior updates, the most recent being XtremIO 2.4, were on the other hand non-disruptive updates (NDU) meaning they could be done in-place with no damage to data. As a refresher, XtremIO 3.0 is due for GA this month and brings many improvements including online data compression, performance boost and increased scalability. For XtremIO customers, these are welcome enhancements but there's a cost. EMC had to make material changes to the way data is structured on the arrays, which is the core reason the DU is required for 3.0. For all the excitement that has spread about this update via Twitter, enthusiast blogs and XtremIO competitors, one fact remains; the online vitriol is largely one-way. XtremIO customers don't seem to care all that much about the update being disruptive.
That blanket statement surely sets off warning sirens and only furthers the conspiracy claims from the aforementioned socially active crowd who I remind you, are not XtremIO customers. To get to the bottom of this issue, I talked to customers and partners to get a more complete picture as to what's going on. The story from all of them is pretty close to the same. When evaluating XtremIO in a proof of concept, customers were informed that migration to 3.0 would be destructive to their data. Of course not everyone knew; EMC's a big company with many channel partners selling a lot of products. It's probable that some customers didn't know about the DU and when the news peaked last week they were surprised. The naysayers will also point to EMC marketing materials that still show XtremIO offering NDU. While not accurate in going from 2.4 to 3.0, all systems shipping with 3.0 today and future updates should be non-disruptive.
For their part EMC is trying to make a major update into something that's no more than an annoyance. EMC is providing all of their customers with loaner gear (swing kit) and professional services at no cost to facilitate the migration. For most environments that are virtualized, the process is pretty simple. A local Cincinnati customer described it as such, "Storage vMotion. Upgrade. Storage vMotion." The brevity confers the point that to him, it was no big deal and he didn't need the swing kit or professional services. Not everyone will have it so easy, but at least EMC is picking up the cost associated with the upgrade as it is being made available to customers.
After time to digest and understand the upgrade path, XtremIO customers are coming to similar conclusions as a healthcare customer describes, "Having this kind of upgrade process, really does suck in 2014. I guess we've gotten so used to an "always on" type environment. The offer of swing hardware and professional services pretty much solves [my upgrade] problems."
The debate about whether or not the upgrade path should have been destructive is irrelevant. 3.0 is a DU and EMC made the decision to bite the bullet now instead of in the future where the pain would involve more customers. They fully expect XtremIO 3.x and beyond to be non-disruptive, more aligned with typical releases in the industry. For those that want to stay on the current 2.4 code they can and EMC will support them for "years to come," according to Chad Sakac's detailed blog post on this issue. It is however unlikely that EMC will invest much into that code base and customers who stay will not benefit from the performance and data reduction benefits 3.0 offers.
EMC is a highly visible target, so when something like this happens it's understandable for the IT world to get in a tizzy given the fodder and opportunity to attack. The bottom line though is simple. The update is destructive and it stinks to have to do it. EMC is providing loaner hardware and free professional services to make it as painless as possible and they've indicated this shouldn't happen again. Customers are a bit miffed, but not nearly as outraged as XtremIO's competitors and enthusiast bloggers would have you believe.
