Qtier and SSD Cache Comparison
Qtier can be used at the same time as SSD cache.
There are three main configuration options when configuring a NAS with a mixture of HDDs and SSDs.
Configuration |
SSD Usage |
HDD Usage |
---|---|---|
Qtier Storage Pool |
Qtier Storage Pool (combined with HDDs) |
Qtier Storage Pool (combined with SSDs) |
SSD Cache |
SSD cache |
HDD-only storage pool |
All-SSD Storage Pool |
SSD-only storage pool |
HDD-only storage pool |
 |
Qtier Storage Pool |
SSD Cache |
All-SSD Storage Pool |
---|---|---|---|
Total file storage space |
High (SSDs + HDDs) |
Moderate (HDDs only) |
Low (SSDs only) |
Maximum SSD capacity |
No limit |
Up to 4 TB depending on installed memory |
No limit |
SSD expansion |
Expand as needed |
Limited by available memory |
Expand as needed |
Applicable storage |
Thick volumes, thin volumes and block-based LUNs in the pool |
All volumes and LUNs on the NAS |
Volumes and LUNs created on the SSDs |
Data migration |
Scheduled or when NAS load is low |
Automatic |
No migration required |
Data migration method |
QTS writes incoming data to the SSD tier and moves data to different tiers based on access frequency. |
|
No migration required |
Recommended use cases |
|
|
Applications require consistent intensive random read-write access |
Usage examples |
File server, web server, email servers, basic database services (With Qtier IO Aware) |
Video editing, virtualization |
Business critical database or other application |