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September 16, 2020
Topics: Google CloudAdvanced8 minute readCloud Volumes Service for GCP
As you consider moving enterprise workloads to the cloud or deploying new enterprise applications in the cloud, you need a storage environment that delivers high data availability and very strong data durability. You also need rich, integrated data management capabilities that help you scale storage with your business and protect your data from accidents, attacks, and other incidents that are increasingly common in a cloud-connected world. NetApp® Cloud Volumes Service for Google Cloud was built to meet these needs, and we’re thrilled to announce new regional availability, a new software-defined service level that expands regional access, and new cross-region volume replication.
Cloud Volumes Service was introduced in Google Cloud as a fully managed cloud-native file storage service in 2018 and has won two consecutive Google Cloud Partner of the Year awards in infrastructure. It’s easy to understand the appeal of the service. Cloud Volumes Service delivers what users need in a high-performance, enterprise-grade file storage service. It provides a simple yet compelling set of secure data management capabilities that are needed for running enterprise workloads like Windows, virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), SAP HANA, and VMware. And we haven’t been sitting still. With Google, we have continued to jointly innovate, improving Cloud Volumes Service in areas that help address your workload requirements while minimizing the management overhead and experience needed to consume enterprise file storage.
Migrating enterprise workloads to Google Cloud
Because of its long history of technology leadership in storage, NetApp deeply understands what it takes to deploy critical workloads on Google Cloud. For example, Windows customers are looking to lift and shift Windows Servers with SMB protocol support to accelerate migration, consolidate distributed file servers, and modernize digital workspaces. SAP HANA customers have to ensure optimal application performance at scale for efficient development lifecycles, while simultaneously delivering data protection for near-zero recovery time objective (RTO) critical workloads. Finally, all customers need to reduce the amount of storage and costs necessary for data protection, while shortening the time to recover from losses. NetApp has improved capabilities in all of these areas over the past 7 months to enable successful deployment of enterprise workloads to Google Cloud:
- Enabled support for SMBv3 multichannel for improved throughput on Windows workloads
- Received certification for use with SAP HANA scale-up workloads
- Introduced support for Terraform provider infrastructure automation to help quickly stand up Cloud Volumes Service alongside application and other cloud infrastructure
And now, we are pleased to announce our most recent updates, which help raise the bar on what users expect for file storage in the cloud.
Software-defined Cloud Volumes Service
Our best-in-class file storage service and its data management capabilities are now software defined to deliver the Cloud Volumes Service experience locally in the region where you operate your workloads. Because Cloud Volumes Service is now accessible in regions and zones where your workloads are running, you no longer need to be concerned about deploying your workloads out of the country, or accessing across boundaries where costs and latency are high. The cloud-native, scalable, and flexible enterprise storage architecture is the first partner enterprise storage system delivered with Google Kubernetes Engine. NetApp and Google engineers collaborated on Kubernetes storage and networking features to deliver this first-of-a-kind storage service over the past several months. The outcome of this partnership is that you now have access to more service-level options.
The existing CVS-Performance service type with its three service levels (standard, premium, extreme) is now complemented by the software-defined version of Cloud Volumes Service. This software-defined version offers a single service level (Standard-SW) providing a balance of capacity and performance that is ideal for general-purpose workloads that need to scale quickly. Both service types offer:
- Native NetApp Snapshot™ capabilities. Make copies of your data for near-zero RPO/RTO disaster recovery, migration, or rehydration.
- Innovative mix of protocol support. Cloud Volumes Service supports volumes created for both NFS and SMB.
- Flexible scaling. Get nondisruptive volume resizing and performance that scale to fit your needs. Volumes of up to 100TB each, with up to 100 volumes per zone per project, can scale to up to 500 volumes per project.
- Security. Google Cloud’s multilayer infrastructure security protects your data, which is encrypted at rest through strong AES 256-bit encryption and is delivered securely through the Google private services access framework.
In addition, the software-defined Cloud Volumes Service also adds:
- Better coverage. Because Cloud Volumes Service is no longer hardware dependent, the service will be available in all regions and zones where your workloads are currently running. However, the initial release offers a limited number of regions, which will expand as the service grows.
- Improved availability. Because the service is designed to have 99.95% availability, you can protect data in a single zone with minimal outages or downtime. If an instance outage occurs, the service automatically moves the volume’s persistent disk to another instance to maintain availability without disrupting the application.
- Better starting performance levels. The Standard-SW tier provides 32MiBps per TiB of performance.
Software-Defined Cloud Volumes Service CVS-Performance Data management capabilities X X Cross-region replication X Data availability 99.95% 99.9% Scalability 100TB per volume, up to 100 volumes per zone per project 100TB per volume, up to 100 volumes per project per region Security Encrypted at rest with AES 256-bit encryption Encrypted at rest with AES 256-bit encryption Performance Standard-SW (32MiBps per TiB) Standard (16MiBps per TiB)
Premium (64MiBps per TiB)
Extreme (128MiBps per TiB)Regional availability New
- Oregon (us-west1)
- South Carolina (us-east1)
- Belgium (europe-west1)
- Finland (europe-north1)
- São Paulo (southamerica-east1)
New
- Netherlands (europe-west4)
- Montreal (northamerica-northeast1)
- Singapore (asia-southeast1)
Previously available
- N. Virginia (us-east4)
- Iowa (us-central1)
- Los Angeles (us-west2)
- Frankfurt (europe-west3)
- London (europe-west2)
- Sydney (australia-southeast1)
Cloud Volumes Service now covers over half of Google Cloud’s regions
With this release, we have made it easier to deploy workloads where you need them. For those who have data sovereignty, cross-zone or cross-region latency, or multiregion deployment requirements in regions where our service was not previously available, Cloud Volumes Service is now offered in 8 new Google Cloud regions. In addition to the existing 6 regions, bringing the total number of regions supported to 14. With Cloud Volumes Service, we are also now able to react more quickly to new demand in regions and provide service availability quickly to these regions where needed.
Cross-region volume replication is now available in preview
One of the features in highest demand from file service platforms is the ability to protect data across regions. Because businesses running in Google Cloud require maximum uptime, it’s critical to provide network-efficient replicas of volumes across regions so that business applications can continue if a regional outage occurs. Cloud Volumes Service now offers cross-region volume replication with the CVS-Performance service type. With NetApp SnapMirror® technology, application owners and business owners can easily set up a replication relationship for their volumes across regions. When an unintended outage occurs, they can quickly perform a disaster recovery failover of their workload to the new region with minimal downtime and data loss.
Cross-region volume replication uses block-level tracking, which makes it the most efficient replication technology available in Google Cloud today. This feature significantly reduces the amount of data being replicated, which in turn reduces volume replication time. You can replicate as frequently as every 10 minutes so that you have a copy of your most recent data. You can access the volume replica in real time as a read-only volume. If needed, you can break the replication mirror to allow write access for the volume (for example, for disaster recovery tests, or for partner use). When the original volume becomes available, such as after a network outage, you can resynchronize the relationship and operate back from your source volume. You don’t have to resend the volume data to the destination region again.
Cross-region volume replication will initially be available for preview in these regions:
- Los Angeles (us-west2)
- Iowa (us-central1)
- N. Virginia (us-east4)
- London (europe-west2)
- Frankfurt (europe-west3)
Shortly afterward, it will also be available in:
- Netherlands (europe-west4)
- Singapore (asia-southeast1)
We’re excited to bring so much new functionality to Google Cloud users in this release. With software-defined Cloud Volumes Service, you now get expanded regional access to the service’s best-in-class capabilities. Expanded service availability means that you are now covered in over half of Google Cloud’s regions. And with volume replication now available in preview, you can rest assured that data availability for your mission-critical applications is always at your fingertips if an unforeseen circumstance affects a region.
Are you ready to give it a try? We’re offering 25TB of Cloud Volumes Service free of charge. Sign up today.
To learn more, visit Cloud Volumes Service for Google Cloud.
Chris Wong
Chris Wong is the product manager for NetApp Cloud Volumes Service for Google Cloud. To meet the needs of businesses and users who are migrating to or building solutions in Google Cloud, Chris is working on executing the next generation of fully managed file storage services with Google. He has been with NetApp for 5 years and has a deep background in storage and data protection. Chris has previous experience as a product manager and technical marketing engineer in supporting NetApp AltaVault™ as well as NetApp Cloud Backup Service for NetApp Cloud Volumes ONTAP® and for Azure NetApp Files.