Why You Should Make Adopting Current Long-Life Releases a Habit
Hey everyone — At Pure Storage, we see many customers who still think about storage upgrades like old-school firmware: “set it and forget it” until it’s forced to change. But FlashArray isn’t firmware — it’s modern, continually improved, and designed for an agile, secure, predictable data platform. That means it’s time to make adopting recent Long-Life Releases (LLRs) a regular habit — not just something you reluctantly do, "when you have to". LLRs should be your standard practice: ✅ Fresh Features, Mature Code Each LLR is built on code that’s been running in production for at least 8 months before it branches. That means you get the innovations from recent Feature Releases — tested, stabilized, and production-proven. You avoid missing out on valuable improvements while still benefiting from enterprise-grade predictability. ✅ Consistent Security and Compliance Aging too far behind, even on an LLR, can expose you to security vulnerabilities and unsupported configurations. By habitually adopting recent LLRs, you ensure you’re in the supported window for critical patches and compliance audits — avoiding fire drills later. ✅ Reduce Technical Debt Getting stuck on very old LLRs can build up technical debt. Skipping multiple versions makes your next upgrade harder, riskier, and more time-consuming. Keeping up with recent LLRs means smoother transitions, less operational friction, and easier adoption of the next improvements. ✅ Keep Innovation Flowing The idea that an LLR is “old code” is a myth. Recent LLRs contain carefully chosen, well-hardened feature improvements. If you wait too long, you lock yourself out of meaningful performance, efficiency, and capability gains that your peers are already using. ✅ Break the Firmware Mentality FlashArray is software-driven, and has a rapid but reliable development model. Treating it like outdated firmware, and you miss the true value. The LLR program is designed precisely to let you safely adopt modern features and maintain enterprise-grade stability — and maintain a predictable cadence. Bottom line? Adopting recent Long-Life Releases, habitually, is the best way to get modern features, maintain security, reduce upgrade risk, and keep your environment aligned with Pure’s best practices. You deserve innovation and peace of mind — don’t settle for less by sticking with outdated code. If you want help reviewing which LLR is right for you, or understanding the timelines, just reach out — we’re here to help you stay current, secure, and ahead of the game.191Views5likes2CommentsAnnouncing the General Availability of Purity//FA 6.5.11 LLR
We are happy to announce the general availability of 6.5.11, the twelfth release in the 6.5 Long-Life Release (LLR) line! This release line is based on the feature set introduced in 6.4, providing long-term consistency in capabilities, user experience, and interoperability, with the latest fixes and security updates. This 6.5 LLR line has demonstrated sufficient accumulated runtime data to be recommended for critical customer workloads and has been declared Enterprise Ready (ER) effective with the 6.5.3 release. For more detailed information about bug fixes and security updates included in each release, see the release notes. UPGRADE RECOMMENDATIONS AND EOL SCHEDULE We recommend customers already running 6.5 who are looking for the latest fixes and updates to upgrade to this long-life release. When possible, customers should make use of Self-Service Upgrades (SSU) to ease the process of planning and executing non-disruptive Purity upgrades for their fleet. The 6.5 LLR line is planned for development through September 2026. HARDWARE SUPPORT This release is supported on the following FlashArray Platforms: FA//M (R2), FA//X, FA//C, and FA//XL. Note, DFS software version 2.2.3 is recommended with this release. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to thank everyone within the engineering, support, technical program management, product management, product marketing, finance and technical product specialist teams who contributed to this release. LINKS AND REFERENCES Purity//FA 6.5 Release Notes Self-Service Upgrades Purity//FA Release and End-of-Life Schedule FlashArray Hardware and End-of-Support DirectFlash Shelf Software Compatibility Matrix FlashArray Capacity and Feature Limits110Views1like0CommentsUsing FlashArray Volume Snapshots with Microsoft SQL Server
FlashArray volume snapshots are an amazing tool for any DBA/DBRE managing SQL Server. You can use them to: Instantly recover from user errors or ransomware attacks Create rapid dev/test copies without full restores Offload CHECKDB to another host to avoid production performance hits Refresh reporting environments on demand Seed Always On availability groups faster, without large full backups Enable point-in-time recovery when paired with SQL log backups And the best part? Snapshots on FlashArray are: Immutable Space-efficient Fast to create and restore Fully automatable through the REST API or SDK tools! I worked very closely with our SQL Server field super stars (Anthony Nocentino, Andrew Pruski and Andrew Yun) on a white paper going VERY deep into the architecture and how to. It includes everything from crash- vs. application-consistent snapshots, to step-by-step restore and cloning procedures, to using SQL Server 2022’s new T-SQL snapshot backup. Did we miss anything ? Let us know!38Views2likes0CommentsNew SQL Server with Pure Storage Reference Architecture!
We have a new SQL Server with Pure Storage Reference Architecture! It’s been out for a few months, but this is a great start to your journey to a simpler, high-performance database environment! This reference architecture shows how to: Consolidate transactional and analytical SQL Server workloads using FlashArray Use FlashBlade for rapid, parallel T-SQL backups to file or object storage Enable zero-downtime operations with ActiveCluster and near-synchronous replication via ActiveDR With this RA you will find detailed technical guidance for storage provisioning for SQL Server databases on Windows or Linux as well as best practice guidence on how to take the best advantage of the primary storage layer. Check out the full reference architecture here: Optimizing SQL Server Operations and Scale with Pure Storage (PDF) Have feedback, use cases to share, or questions about implementation? Please reach out!35Views2likes0CommentsBackup and Restore FA Configuration
Hi All, Purestorage has how to save or backup and restore configuration when an issue occurs? For example, the software crashed and could not be used anymore. Once the problem was fixed, we restored the existing configuration file from backup.Solved258Views2likes6CommentsActiveCluster Asynchronous
Hello Having question about ActiveCluster Asynchronous is it possible to configure between 2 existing clusters Poland to Germany . Idea is to have ability to perform DR tests in Datacenters located in different country The customer is currently running a configuration based on X20R2/R4. They have two systems in the Poland and two in the Germany. Local replication between arrays is configured using ActiveCluster Synchronous. ################## Reviewed documentation is ActiveCluster over Fibre Channel and ActiveDR or Async is supported on the same system starting with Purity 6.1.3+. ActiveDR must be configured with separate volumes (and pods) from ActiveCluster volumes. ActiveCluster asynchronous works in such way that that both arrays Metro Arrays replicate data to 3d array protection group snapshot only Leveraging asynchronous replication is easy to do, it's a simple matter of defining a Target array in a Protection Group after connecting the array. Once defined in a Protection Group, the Protection Group itself can be moved into an ActiveCluster (our synchronous replication, RPO0 replication service) Pod, where the Protection Group is owned by two arrays. The defined Target can replicate regularly scheduled snapshots to a third array. This Active-Active Asynchronous Replication is shared by the ActiveCluster arrays and in the event that either array is offline, the alternate array will assume ownership of continual snapshot replication to the third array. In summary, you can replicate snapshots as desired between any number of arrays to any other number of arrays, requiring a defined array connection and Protection Group Target. These Protection Groups can also be moved into a pod for sharing between ActiveCluster arrays for disaster recovery purposes as well. The sequence of steps for enabling asynchronous replication: Connect arrays so the source and target arrays are aware of each other Create a Protection Group with desired snapshot policies Add any array to replicate snapshots to the Target field If using in an ActiveCluster pair, move the Protection Group into the ActiveCluster podSolved172Views1like3CommentsPurity FA 6.6.10* Introduces Better Data Security
Purity FA 6.6.10 introduces better data security by auditing file access. This means for all SMB and NFS shares, all access events can be captured and recorded to a local file or sent to a remote CIS log server. Check out the Pure Storage //Launch Round-Up for August! Have more questions? We’re all ears!51Views1like0CommentsAre you planning to implement vSphere 8 U1 on FlashArray?
Are you planning to implement vSphere 8 U1 on FlashArray? Why or why not? Have you heard? NVMe over Fabrics with VMware Virtual Volumes - “with VMware vSphere 8 U1, FlashArray is now validated with support for Virtual Volumes (vVols) when using NVMe over Fabrics (NVMe-oF) FC/TCP. Check it out here!28Views0likes0CommentsSelf-Service Upgrades = Full Control!
For those of you who have already tried Self-Service Upgrades (SSU) for FlashArray™, what were (are) the biggest challenges you encounter in managing your fleet’s upgrades? Whether you’re running multiple upgrades in parallel or just handling one at a time, it’s all in your hands! Check it out.32Views0likes0Comments