Array
Networks Inc. today announced the results of recent testing by The
Tolly Group that benchmarked performance and scaling of
industry-leading NGFW virtual appliances (VAs) running as multiple
instances on Array’s AVX
Series Network Functions Platform. Testing showed that performance
improved by up to 86 percent greater than the NGFW manufacturer’s
specifications for multiple VAs running simultaneously on the AVX
Series. In addition, the tests indicated that per-VA transactions per
second (TPS) scaled linearly across small, medium and large instance
sizes, and aggregate system throughput and transactions per second
across all running instances remained highly consistent.
“The lower performance of security VAs running in standard virtual
environments has always been one of the downsides of virtualizing these
critical networking components,” said Kevin Tolly, founder of The Tolly
Group. “Our testing of virtual, or software-defined, next-gen firewalls
clearly shows that Array’s AVX Series virtualized, multitenant platform
overcomes that obstacle to a virtualization strategy and provides linear
scalability for future growth paths.”
Security VAs are commonly deployed on commercial off-the-shelf (COTS)
hardware in virtual environments that, while providing greater
flexibility, use shared resources that can limit performance through
contention. A few vendors offer multitenant appliances intended to
counter the drawbacks of standard virtual environments, however these
solutions often utilize shared resources – with the same performance hit
of standard environments – or support only the manufacturer’s VAs.
The AVX Series is an open platform that provides dedicated resources –
CPU, memory, I/O and SSL hardware – for each VA, thus eliminating
resource contention and providing high performance and throughput. The
AVX Series supports a wide range of networking and security VAs from a
diverse set of third-party manufacturers as well as open-source
initiatives.
In the Tolly testing, the NGFW VAs consistently performed well above
manufacturer’s specifications for the respective VA sizes. In addition,
the AVX Series provides high scalability, ranging from small to large
instance sizes in a mix-and-match configuration. Depending on model and
VA resource requirements, the AVX Series supports up to 32 virtual
instances in just two rack units (RUs). In addition, the Tolly tests
showed that the AVX Series provides highly consistent throughput and TPS
while under a full load of small, medium or large instance sizes.
“The vast majority of enterprise IT departments and service providers
have virtualization strategies either in place or underway,” said Paul
Andersen, vice president of sales and marketing for Array Networks.
“With Array’s network functions platform, they no longer need to
sacrifice performance to gain the agility and flexibility of
virtualization, and the AVX Series offers a clear path for scalability
in the future as well.”
Download
a free copy of The Tolly Group report to review the complete test
methodology and results.
About Array Networks
Array Networks solves performance and complexity challenges for
businesses moving toward virtualized networking, security and
application delivery. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, Array addresses
the growing market demand for Network Functions Virtualization (NFV),
cloud computing, and software-centric networking. Proven at more than
5,000 worldwide customer deployments, Array is recognized by leading
analysts, enterprises, service providers and partners for pioneering
next-generation technology that delivers agility at scale. To learn
more, visit: www.arraynetworks.com.
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