Dell Unity: Recommended Maximum Sustained IOPs Per Drive Type

Summary: This article explains the maximum recommended sustained Input-Output Operations per Second (IOPs) per drive type on Unity arrays.

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Instructions

Drive IOPS and Response Time are key indicators to determine drive overload. Individual drives provide varying levels of performance based on the workload which is applied. Workload attributes such as I/O size, access patterns, queue depth can result in a drive providing more or less IOPS at acceptable response times. In general, Dell Technologies recommends the following values for determining when a drive may be approaching its maximum performance.

 

Recommended Maximum Sustained IOPS Per Drive

  • SAS Flash 2 or 3 > 20,000 IOPS
  • SAS 15K > 350 IOPS
  • SAS 10K > 250 IOPS
  • NL-SAS > 150 IOPS 

 

Newer SAS Flash drives (such as SAS Flash 3) are typically used in all‑flash pools. Earlier generations (for example, SAS Flash 2) are more commonly associated with mixed‑tier pools and FAST VP or FAST Cache configurations. See the Unity Best Practices Guide for more information.  

 

Recommended Maximum Sustained IOPS Per Drive

Figure 1.  Maximum IOPS Recommendation Table

Additional Information

VNX: Recommended Maximum Sustained IOPs Per Drive Type

Affected Products

Dell EMC Unity, Dell EMC Unity XT 380, Dell EMC Unity XT 380F, Dell EMC Unity XT 480, Dell EMC Unity XT 480F, Dell EMC Unity XT 680, Dell EMC Unity XT 680F, Dell EMC Unity XT 880, Dell EMC Unity Family |Dell EMC Unity All Flash, Dell EMC Unity Hybrid

Products

Dell EMC Unity XT 880F
Article Properties
Article Number: 000022779
Article Type: How To
Last Modified: 04 سبتمبر 2026
Version:  7
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