QNAP ES2486dc NAS Rack (2U) Intel® Xeon® D D-2142IT 96 GB DDR4 0 TB QNAP Enterprise System Black

Powerful and cost-efficient Intel Xeon D-based Enterprise ZFS NAS, optimized for inline deduplication and all-flash applications

The ES2486dc Enterprise ZFS NAS is QNAP's first all-flash array high-availability NAS with dual active controllers. Powered by an Intel Xeon D-2142IT 8-core/16-thread processor, the ES2486dc supports up to 24 x 2.5" SAS 12 Gbps SSDs and provides excellent I/O throughput. Random write performance for all-flash arrays is supported by the flash-optimized QES 2.1.1 operating system installed on the ES2486dc. QES leverages ZFS to support logical volume management, block-based inline data deduplication and inline compression reduce I/O and SSD storage consumption, significantly extending the lifespan of SSDs for a higher price-performance ratio for all-flash storage arrays. Coupled with nearly unlimited snapshots and SnapSync for data backup, the QES-based ES2486dc meets demanding business applications, such as mission-critical file servers, virtualization servers, VDI, mid-sized data centers, video streaming, surveillance storage, and efficient file backups and restores.

Active-Active High Availability with Optimal Storage Efficiency
In an active-active storage system architecture, both controllers can provide a comprehensive range of performance, which differs from the active-standby architecture of single-controller systems. The active-active architecture does not have the disadvantage of unused computing resources. To leverage the strengths of the ES2486dc's active-active controller architecture, QNAP recommends creating multiple storage pools and distributing ownership between both controllers to enable simultaneous output from both controllers for improved load balancing.

Active-Standby Single-Controller System
With two HA systems, you pay double the price, and the HA system can lead to load imbalances as workloads are only processed on the active system. Furthermore, a power outage can lead to data loss, while network disconnections invalidate the HA architecture.

Active-Active Dual-Controller System
Both controllers of the ES2486dc can carry traffic, along with Copy-To-Flash protection against power failure and the two-way SAS interface. In addition to conserving computing resources, a high-speed, uninterrupted, and highly available storage service is also provided via communication protocols such as SMB, NFS, and iSCSI.

Intel Xeon D Dual Controllers Optimize Inline Deduplication and SSD Utilization
Equipped with Intel Xeon D-2142IT 8-core/16-thread processors, the ES2486dc delivers massive computing power to maximize inline data deduplication and inline compression performance. The active-active dual-controller architecture enables failover/failback operations, as the standby controller can quickly take over functions in case of a controller failure. Redundant, hot-swappable power supplies and fans are also included to provide businesses with virtually fault-tolerant high availability. The ES2486dc is connected via dual-path Mini-SAS design to the JBOD enclosure (EJ1600 v2) to ensure continuous operation even if a JBOD cable is disconnected.

Multi-Level Cache Technology with Read and Write Support Boosts Storage Performance
The ES2486dc simultaneously supports main memory read cache (L1 ARC), SSD secondary read cache (L2 ARC), and storage write cache ZFS Intent Log (ZIL) for synchronous transactions to meet the performance requirements for various business applications.

Flexible Use of SAS or SATA SSDs within Your IT Budget
While SATA 6 Gbps SSDs offer a powerful and affordable storage solution, this type of drive is unsuitable for dual-controller environments due to a lack of dual-port support. By using a QDA-SA3 adapter, specifically designed for QNAP All-Flash Enterprise ZFS NAS, a 6 Gbps SATA drive can be used in the 2.5" SAS drive bay of the ES2486dc, allowing for storage capacity expansion with cost-effective SATA drives. By installing a SATA SSD with the QDA-SA3 into the dual-controller ES2486dc, the SATA SSD can leverage these benefits of SAS dual-port to ensure a highly available, fault-tolerant storage environment for businesses.

PCIe Expansion for 25GbE/40GbE High-Speed Networks
The ES2486dc offers two PCIe Gen 3.0 x8 slots connected to the CPU, allowing you to install lightning-fast 10GbE/25GbE/40GbE network cards to improve virtualization, media streaming, and other bandwidth-intensive applications. Installing a Smart NIC that supports iSER can improve VMware virtualization performance. You can also install a SAS expansion card (SAS-12G2E) to connect up to seven EJ1600 v2 16-bay expansion enclosures to seamlessly expand potential storage capacity to over 1 PB, with an unparalleled performance of up to 48 Gbps per host connection.

Dual-Controller NAS: High Performance, High Reliability, and High Availability
The ES2486dc uses two active-active controllers to provide reliable mission-critical applications in IT storage.

QES 2.1.1: ZFS-based and Optimized for All-Flash Performance
The ES2486dc is equipped with the QES (QNAP Enterprise Storage) 2.1.1 operating system, based on the simple and efficient FreeBSD kernel and the ZFS file system for high-end enterprise applications. QES 2.1.1 not only offers reliable data protection, recovery, and business-class features, but is also optimized for flash storage to achieve outstanding performance from all-flash storage arrays, accelerate mission-critical services, and eliminate challenges in VDI environments. QES 2.1.1 also features Quality of Service (QoS) functions to ensure consistent primary storage performance in multi-application environments. The flash-optimized QES 2.1.1 maintains the same ease of use as the intuitive QTS, making it easy for enterprise users to learn and quickly implement into existing IT infrastructures.

Unleashed SSD Potential – Cost-Effective and Agile with Ultimate Performance
QES 2.1.1 includes QNAP's exclusive Write Coalescing algorithm, which further optimizes all-flash performance in ZFS, providing an extremely cost-effective all-flash solution for enterprise data management and mission-critical services.

Write Coalescing Algorithm
Transforms all random writes into sequential writes while simultaneously reducing I/O. It not only effectively increases random write performance in all-flash environments but also improves the lifespan of SSDs.
Software-Defined Over-Provisioning
Users can define an additional over-provisioning ratio for SSDs (from 1% to 60%) and storage pools (from 1% to 40%) for a consistent performance increase of over 100%.

Deduplication and Compression Optimize Storage Utilization for Virtualization
The QES-based ES2486dc offers businesses the most cost-effective virtual remote desktop platform and mission-critical information storage.

Inline Data Deduplication
Block-based data deduplication optimizes storage utilization and significantly reduces storage capacity requirements.
Inline Compression
Reduces data size to reduce storage I/O workloads and improve performance. In VDI, deduplicated virtual desktops can be more easily cached for optimal performance.
Inline Compaction
Especially helpful for increasing the efficiency of SSD storage utilization when highly repetitive data or massive small files (e.g., transaction logs from banks or e-commerce) are generated. Provides higher cost efficiency for all-flash storage systems.

Self-Healing Ensures Data Integrity and Reliability
Designed with a focus on data integrity, the QES-based ES2486dc uses its end-to-end checksums to detect and correct silent data corruption caused by hardware, firmware, or metadata errors. If data integrity violations are detected, QES automatically repairs the data with the data from the other mirror before handing it over to the applications.

Optimizes Remote Backups with Nearly Unlimited Snapshots and SnapSync
The ES2486dc supports up to 65,535 snapshots for iSCSI LUN and shared folders. In other words, if a snapshot is taken every hour and 24 snapshots are created per day, you can create snapshots for up to 7 years without having to delete them! The ES2486dc also replicates snapshots to remote servers via block-level SnapSync. In the event of a primary site failure, SnapSync helps businesses resume essential services in the shortest possible time.

VMware SRM
SnapSync supports VMware Site Recovery Manager (SRM), an enterprise-class remote backup and disaster recovery solution for virtual applications. With the Storage Replication Adapter (SRA) for SRM, ESXi server operating costs can be transferred to the QNAP NAS to accelerate and simplify virtual machine backup and recovery.

Business Continuity
Copy-on-write technology allows QES snapshots to be created almost instantly without affecting ongoing data collection. SnapSync supports incremental backups, real-time deduplication, and compression. The source ES2486dc performs deduplication before compressing the metadata to reduce synchronized data and save bandwidth resources.

Create VMware/Windows Backups for VSS-Enabled Applications with QNAP Snapshot Agent
QNAP Netbak Replicator is an easy-to-use and VSS-enabled backup software that helps businesses create complete backups in data centers and virtualization environments without needing additional software. To set up a QNAP Snap Agent and VSS hardware provider operating environment, all applications, including VSS Service, Requestor, Provider, and QNAP Snap Agent, can be used with VSS-enabled applications on the same server, and the minimum requirements are only an ES2486dc and a server.

Compatible with VMware, Microsoft, and Citrix Virtualization and Supports iSER
The ES2486dc supports VMware vSphere 6.5, Windows Server 2019, and Citrix XenServer 7.0 for flexible deployment and management in virtualization environments. It also supports VMware VAAI and Microsoft ODX for performance enhancement by offloading server load for ESXi servers and Hyper-V, respectively. QNAP's vSphere client plug-in and web plug-in are also supported to increase the efficiency of operations and management in virtualization applications. The ES2486dc and VMware ESXi servers with Smart NICs that support iSER can gain iSER advantages to offload CPU workloads with increased VMware virtualization performance.

OpenStack-Ready to Identify Out-of-the-Box Enterprise Cloud Services
QES supports OpenStack Cinder and Manila File Sharing services. With the QNAP Cinder driver, the ES2486dc can provide block-level storage to virtual machines. This not only accelerates the deployment of virtual machines and improves the efficiency of accessing virtual machine images but also simplifies integration with commercial cloud storage platforms, providing businesses with a flexible, user-friendly, and cost-effective storage solution.