Dell Technologies announces a new class of modern storage platform

Dell Technologies has introduced Dell PowerStore Elite, a new class of modern storage platform that delivers breakthrough performance and efficiency through software-driven innovation and a fully refreshed hardware platform. PowerStore Elite supports block, file, virtual machines and container workloads with mixed-generation clustering that lets existing customers adopt the latest PowerStore without disruption.

Enterprise storage decisions have never been more important. Data is exploding. AI workloads are expanding. Cyber threats are intensifying. Flash supply dynamics are putting new pressure on infrastructure planning. And IT teams are expected to modernize through all of it, without adding complexity, risk or operational overhead.

PowerStore Elite is built for this moment. It’s an intelligent, open storage platform combining AI-driven software, next generation hardware and non-disruptive modernization so customers can keep storage infrastructure modern as future requirements change.

Software-driven innovation at the core

PowerStore Elite’s software advancements deliver up to 3x more performance1 and 3x more throughput2 than previous generation systems on a unified platform built to adapt as workloads evolve:

·         Eliminate performance tradeoffs: PowerStore Elite delivers enterprise-class performance on either TLC or QLC media, so customers choose based on capacity and cost, rather than tier. New Autonomous Data Path intelligence applies per-I/O machine learning to optimize for QLC and future SSDs, and log-structured metadata extends usable capacity and endurance on high-capacity drives.

·         Higher efficiency, lower overhead: Unaligned deduplication for unstructured data and enhanced compression offloads increases usable capacity with zero performance or workload impact.

·         I/O-level telemetry: Delivers deep visibility into every read and write operation, speeding root cause analysis and laying the groundwork for forthcoming inline ransomware detection capabilities.

·         Software-driven performance gains: Metadata Acceleration serves reads up to 70% faster for all PowerStore customers 3 accelerating the lookups behind file searches and everyday operations that slow down as your data grows.

Next-generation hardware, standards-based by design

PowerStore Elite’s refreshed hardware, based on Intel Xeon Scalable processors with up to 50% more Intel CPU cores 4, DDR5 memory, PCIe Gen 5 support and a new 200Gb RDMA node interconnect improves internal load balancing and failover.

Available in three new models, Dell PowerStore 1500, 5500 and 9500, PowerStore Elite packs up to 40 drives and 5.8 petabytes of effective capacity into a single 3U chassis.5 It delivers up to 3x the density of prior generations6 on low-profile E3 NVMe flash. Because that flash is industry-standard rather than proprietary, customers benefit from broader supply, competitive pricing and freedom from vendor lock-in, a meaningful advantage in today's constrained supply environment. Up to 40 network ports per appliance, with 64Gb FC (128Gb-ready) and 200/400Gb Ethernet-ready connectivity, provide the flexibility to consolidate workloads at scale.

Industry-best 6:1 data reduction guarantee

Dell’s data reduction guarantee has long been a competitive advantage. With advancements in data path efficiency and hardware-assisted compression, PowerStore Elite raises the bar from 5:1 to a new industry-best 6:1 guarantee7 that helps customers offset costs with predictable, long-term storage economics, even in supply constrained environments.

PowerStore Elite integrates into existing environments without forcing customers to rethink how they operate. New systems cluster with earlier PowerStore deployments, data and workloads move without downtime, and capacity or performance can be added incrementally where it delivers the most value.

Lifecycle Extension (LCE) reinforces this model by turning modernization into an ongoing benefit. Existing customers can transition to PowerStore Elite more cost-effectively, while new deployments get a predictable path to stay current. Customers receive data-in-place upgrades with deployment included, a dedicated technical advisor and buy-three-get-one-free capacity expansions, all backed by 24/7 Dell ProSupport or ProSupport Plus.

AI-powered simplicity

From individual arrays to fleet-wide operations, PowerStore Elite puts AI to work where it matters most. Built-in intelligence reduces manual effort by up to 95%,8 continuously balancing workloads, tuning performance and improving efficiency in real time.

At the fleet level, Dell AIOps capabilities extend that intelligence across the entire environment with predictive insight and automation, allowing administrators to offload manual reporting, performance trending and capacity planning. With AIOps, customers can resolve issues up to 10x faster than traditional approaches9. Dell Cyber Detect is a new integrated offering that extends AI-powered ransomware detection directly into Dell PowerStore. Trained on thousands of ransomware variants and inspecting data at the byte level with 99.99% accuracy,10 it pinpoints the last known clean copy so organizations can recover fast.

Arthur Lewis, president, Infrastructure Solutions Group, Dell Technologies said, “Private clouds are only as powerful as the storage underneath them. Nearly 20,000 customers trust PowerStore to run their business and with PowerStore Elite, customers get a generational leap in performance and density on a container-based architecture built to evolve with their workloads. That's what future-proofed infrastructure actually looks like. PowerStore Elite isn't just the next generation, it's the new gold standard.”