Pure Storage recently released version 4.1 of Purity//FB, our latest software release for our unified fast file and object unstructured data platforms. We are joined by Karthik Srinivasan and Andy Kutner from the FlashBlade PM team to get an update on the latest enhancements designed to continue momentum around helping customers solve their most complex scale-out challenges with unstructured data.  The duo covers new capabilities on object lock and quotas, plus file scaling enhancements, snapshot policies, and a deeper dive into TCO, environmental and security improvements. Get everything you need to know on this new release in this episode of the Pure Report.  For more info on Purity//FB 4.1, go to: https://blog.purestorage.com/products/flashblade-4-1-more-performance-security-and-flexibility-for-all-flashblade-customers/

New Purity//FB 4.1 - Innovation for File and Object at Scale

Jump in on a second episode of the Better Science series with guest host and Technical Evangelist Justin Emerson interviewing FlashArray engineer Feng Wang about how Pure maps data at scale with a single, scalable data structure. Managing storage in modern times requires a strategy for storing quadrillions of bits: petabytes of data, all stored efficiently on dense flash, with the ability to scale even larger in the future.  But, how do you find anything in this huge ocean of bits?
In this episode, Justin and Feng explore how the industry at large has approached this problem historically, talk about the current state of the art, and how Pure’s approach to this mapping problem is uniquely suited to today’s modern data landscape.  Get ready to dive deep into why Pure makes architectural decisions to approach problems in new, innovative ways that have game-changing and long-lasting impacts.  For more information on Better Science, go to: https://blog.purestorage.com/perspectives/better-science-volume-2-maps-metadata-and-the-pyramid/

Better Science Volume 2: Maps, Metadata, and the Pyramid

The Unplugged crew is back with Andrew Miller and JD Wallace continuing to take you through the 15 Pure Architectural Decisions.  On this episode, we tackle Pure's adaptive flexible RAID, including a spin thru the history of RAID and how took out the need for user intervention to provide a more intuitive solution.  Then we hit on the field perspective for the recent FlashBlade//E announcement and implications for data repositories and the inefficiencies of disk.  Finally, it's Tip of the Week to remind everyone that Pure's ransomware mitigation feature, SafeMode, is now auto-on for arrays that go out. Better protection from hacks, right out of the box.  To send feedback or topic suggestions, email purereport@purestorage.com and check out www.purestorage.com/flashblade for more on the new FlashBlade//E product and how we can help you take out spinning disk with flash at the same cost with way better TCO.

Unplugged Vol 12 - Adaptive Flexible RAID, FlashBlade//E and Auto-On SafeMode

It's time for another edition of Unplugged with Andrew Miller and JD Wallace bringing you the 15 Pure Architectural decisions and more.  We start out with a quick recap of Pure's recent Accelerate industry event and some of the key highlights and takeaways.  Then hear about how Pure addresses security and encryption via the Purity operation environment.  We finish with a quick lookback at the significance of Pure's unified block and file announcement for FlashArray and plug a few upcoming fun webinars around disk replacement.  To send feedback on Unplugged and the Pure Report, email: purereport@purestorage.com.

Unplugged Vol 13 - Security/Encryption, Unified Block & File, Accelerate Recap

What happens when a long-time admirer of Pure culture and products joins the company?  Find out with this latest episode featuring Pure System Engineer Scott Nawalaniec, a former customer who joined Pure around a year ago. Hear about Scott's career journey including how he came to consider Pure and the technical and business reasons that led to his now 8 year relationship with the company.  Scott provides deep insight into the evaluations he made at his prior company between the incumbent storage compared to Pure and the notion that every competitive storage model required him to put on a different "spacesuit" to manage and tune the product.  In contrast, Pure provided him a simple and performant solution for database and virtualization operations that grew to over 10-15 arrays over time and improved company operations.  For more on how Pure Storage can help your business move forward successfully, check out: https://www.purestorage.com/

Put Away Your Spacesuit: Insights from a Customer Who Became a Puritan

There's plenty of buzz in the market around Storage as a Service (STaaS) and subscription-based solutions to meeting growing demands around managing escalating quantities of data.  But what's the reality in offerings that really deliver enterprise value vs. those that are more of a smokescreen for fancy financing models?  Hear from Stan Yanitskiy, Digital Experience Solution Architect, in the first of a multi-part series of STaaS episodes designed to help you understand the facts and details around Pure's Evergreen//One subscription offering.  Learn about business drivers compelling enterprises to consider this model, misconceptions behind CAPEX and OPEX, the true meaning behind Pure's guaranteed SLAs matched to business objectives, and the white glove support we provide Evergreen//One customers. Stan will be returning to the Pure Report on regular cadence over the next few months so be on the lookout for new episodes coming soon that dive deeper into SLAs and how a typical customer engagement evolves around subscription-based storage solutions that are flexible and non-disruptive.  For more info on Evergreen//One, go to: https://www.purestorage.com/products/staas/evergreen/one.html

Reality Check On Storage as a Service and Evergreen//One

It's a first for the podcast as we bring the Pure Report Unplugged to the Las Vegas Strip and record live on location in front of an audience at Pure Accelerate 2024.  New locale, same format and co-hosts JD Wallace and Andrew Miller as we navigate thru the highlights of the week at Pure's customer and partner event.  Up top, we hit on our favorite moments of Accelerate - behind the scenes of the Coz demo showcase, JD running FlashDrive demo labs, and Andrew hitting on 150 TB DFMs and Pure Fusion.  Plus much more around the exciting new announcements across fleet management, digital experience (DX). For more information on what went down at Pure Accelerate and to find an upcoming event near you: https://www.purestorage.com/accelerate.html

Unplugged: Live at Accelerate 2024

Join Matt Bradford and Don Poorman as they help me unpack an incredible year of technological advancement at Pure Storage, taking listeners on a thorough journey through our most groundbreaking announcements and product developments. From hardware innovations like the FlashArray//C20 to cutting-edge cloud solutions and AI reference architectures, this episode offers an insider's perspective on how Pure continues to push the boundaries of data storage and management.
Traveling through key solution areas including hardware, cloud, cybersecurity, AI, and digital experience, Matt and Don provide expert commentary on game-changing developments. Highlights include the expansion of Pure Storage Cloud for AVS, exciting enhancements to DRaaS, the transformative OVX reference architecture for AI initiatives, and the introduction of Pure1 assessments that are reshaping how enterprises approach technology evaluation and implementation.
Beyond the technical details, this episode celebrates Pure Storage's commitment to customer-driven innovation and continuous improvement. From the launch of Pure Skill's new subscription-based learning platform to the expansion of Evergreen subscriptions and the intriguing glimpse of an AI Copilot, Matt and Don paint a vivid picture of a technology company relentlessly focused on solving real-world challenges and empowering digital transformation. Whether you're a Pure Storage enthusiast, a technology professional, or simply curious about the latest in data infrastructure, this year-in-review episode is a must-listen.

ICYMI: A Year in Review of Pure Always-On Innovation

We finally chased down the smart and savvy Rob Quast, Principal Technologist at Pure, to discuss the latest trends in the tech world around AI, Networking and Cloud storage. Our conversation kicks off with Rob's journey, from his time at ePlus and working in sys admin roles, to a memorable experience at Pure's NYC Accelerate event where he saw the stock exchange firsthand. We touch on the various aspects of a PT's role, including Rob’s experience showing demos and helping customers understand complex solutions. 

Our conversation shifts to some of Rob's most passionate work, including involvement in a large AI solution for Coreweave. He walks through the intricacies of a massive deal and how it required close collaboration with the product management team, post-validation work, and strategic networking. Rob also shares insights from a hyperscaler win for Pure Storage, explaining what "hyperscaler" means and how they’re used in the industry. We dive into the technical details of large AI deals, such as GPUDirect, and discuss how Pure can better connect with networking professionals. A key theme here is the intersection of data storage and networking, with Rob revealing why NVMe TCP is a game-changer for the future of cloud infrastructure, particularly when compared to technologies like Infiniband.

We close with conversation looking toward the future, exploring the realities of cloud storage and hybrid cloud solutions, and what customers are trying to achieve and the challenges they face. The episode wraps up with a focus on object storage, where Rob discusses how Pure Storage's Fusion platform helps manage global namespaces and facilitates multi-tenant cloud environments.

Inside the World of Large-Scale AI Solutions, Networking, and Cloud Innovation with Rob Quast

Episode 4 of our series around Pure's fundamental design principles dives into aspects of Pure's technology that drive realistic efficiency for users. This episode tackles capabilities most Storage professionals are familiar with - snapshots, efficiency metrics and adaptive flexible RAID.

Pure learned from the challenges created by legacy architectures to build better versions of these features into our all-flash array portfolio. Hear about how Pure Storage’s snapshot architecture focuses on instant, efficient, and immutable copies that serve both operational and security needs. Snapshots can be created instantly with no performance overhead and used for rapid recovery, cloning, or replication—each one functions as a “gold copy version” and maintains group consistency, enabling rollbacks to any point in time without dependencies or data duplication. Their design is tightly integrated with metadata, enabling efficient thin provisioning and consistent protection, while SafeMode extends these benefits by enforcing privileged access and retention policies for ransomware resilience. Around realistic efficiency metrics - we deliver transparent and realistic efficiency metrics by directly reporting space consumption trends and physical storage utilization, rather than relying solely on claims about thin provisioning or data reduction. Our user interface distinguishes between budgeted capacity, usable capacity, and used space, with a focus on showing only live user data (volumes and snapshots), and hiding internal system overhead, RAID overhead, and reclaimable space until critical thresholds are reached. Finally, we tackle RAID - Pure’s RAID architecture is built for flash, utilizing a flexible, adaptive structure that never requires manual configuration while continuously ensuring optimal data protection and performance.

Series Overview: Pure Storage’s foundational approach to product engineering is guided by 15 architectural decisions that were established at the company’s inception and have shaped both the technical and user experience across its product lines. These architectural choices were not made arbitrarily—they stem from a deliberate focus on simplicity, efficiency, and scalability, ensuring Pure could deliver storage solutions that break away from legacy complexity and enable continuous innovation without compromise.  This series will guide viewers through all of the 15 principles, helping you understand why certain choices were made, how they impact your operations, and how they compare to other industry features and products. Join Pure Report podcast hosts Rob Ludeman, Andrew Miller, and J.D Wallace for this fun technical retrospective on Pure Storage.

15 Architectural Decisions Series: Snapshots, Realistic Efficiency Metrics, and Adaptive RAID

Bringing you direct access to Pure Storage thought leaders, technology experts, alliance partners, customer insights, and our latest product news.

New tracks tagged #flashblade