Overview of HPE 3PAR NAS Solutions and File Persona Software Suite

HPE offers several NAS solutions such as the StoreEasy series (based on Windows Storage Server 2012 with deduplication, snapshots, and replication), StorageWorks X9000 (from IBRIX, supporting object storage), and the StoreAll series (supporting file and object services, scalable up to thousands of nodes).

After acquiring 3PAR, HPE shifted focus to the 3PAR product line, which provides strong SAN capabilities and compatibility with existing NAS solutions. The current 3PAR NAS options include a SAN + NAS gateway (3PAR StoreServ File Controller) and an integrated storage system similar to Huawei V3 or NetApp FAS, both leveraging the HPE 3PAR File Persona Software Suite for NAS and object functions.

The File Persona Software Suite, licensed per‑TB, originally supported the 3PAR StoreServ 7000c series and now extends to the 7000, 8000, 10000, and 20000 series. It offers SMB (1.0‑3.0), NFSv3/v4, FTP, and a REST‑based Object Access API, requiring 1 GbE/10 GbE NICs or RCIP ports.

Key features of the suite include user authentication, quota management, file snapshots, WORM, virus scanning, integration with Recovery Manager Central Express Protect, LDAP/Active Directory support, transparent failover for SMB/NFS clients, Adaptive Flash Cache, DFS‑Namespace, COW‑based snapshots, SSD caching, and FIPS 140‑2 encryption.

Antivirus scanning is integrated via ICAP, supporting Symantec Protection Engine 7.5, McAfee VirusScan Enterprise 8.8, and McAfee VirusScan Enterprise for Storage 1.0.2.

The 3PAR StoreServ File Controller (based on Microsoft Windows Storage Server 2012 R2 or 2016) provides file services for 3PAR 7000, 8000, 10000, and 20000 series, supporting SMB/CIFS, NFS, FTP/FTPS, HTTP/HTTPS, WebDAV, and optional iSCSI. Its feature set—enterprise file sync, sub‑file deduplication, snapshots, replication, classification, quotas, QoS, etc.—is less extensive than the File Persona suite but offers higher stability.

Controller deployments typically use two nodes for high availability, scaling up to four nodes per controller and eight nodes in a cluster. HPE’s high‑capacity SSDs (1.8 TB, 3.6 TB, 7.68 TB, 15.36 TB) are encrypted and supported across the StoreServ 20450 and 20850 models, enabling full‑flash NAS and seamless data movement between traditional and flash storage, as well as federated storage configurations.

Overall, HPE 3PAR’s NAS offerings combine flexible software suites, broad protocol support, and advanced hardware capabilities to deliver enterprise‑grade file services on both hybrid and all‑flash platforms.