NetApp's WAFL vs. ZFS feature comparison
|
|
WAFL |
ZFS |
|---|---|---|
|
Devices |
|
|
|
Raid (0,1,0+1,4,5,6) |
Limited to raid-4 |
Yes1, does not support raid-4 |
|
USB storage device support |
No |
Yes |
|
Include Raw devices2 |
Limited |
Yes |
|
Prevents silent data corruption |
No |
Yes |
|
|
|
|
|
On Disk(s) Features |
|
|
|
Copy on Write design |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Block size |
Fixed 4KB |
Real time variable 512 byte to 128KB |
|
File system size |
10's of gigabytes3 maybe terabytes |
Billions of gigabytes |
|
Built in Compression |
No |
Yes |
|
Built in Encryption |
No |
Being developed |
|
End to end checksum |
No |
Yes |
|
Quotas |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Volume support4 |
Yes |
Yes |
|
NFS |
Yes |
Yes |
|
NFSv4 ACL support |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
|
|
|
Snapshots |
|
|
|
Unlimited Snapshots |
Limited to 2555 |
Yes |
|
Read/Write Copies (clones) |
No |
Yes |
|
Snapshots accessible over NFS |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
|
|
|
Administrative Details |
|
|
|
Administrative GUI interface |
Yes |
Yes |
|
Command Line interface |
Yes |
Yes |
|
|
|
|
|
Pricing |
Not free |
Free |
|
License Type |
Commercial |
CDDL |
|
Source code available |
No |
Yes |
Reference material used.
http://opensolaris.org/os/community/zfs/docs/zfsadmin_0525.pdf Solaris ZFS Administrative Guide
http://www.netapp.com/library/tr/3002.pdf Fle System Design for an NFS File Server Appliance
http://www.netapp.com/library/tr/3014.pdf MULTIPROTOCOL DATA ACCESS: NFS, CIFS, AND HTTP
http://www.netapp.com/library/tr/3085.pdf The NFS Version 4 Protocol
Footnotes
1ZFS implements raidz and raidz2 which are advanced versions of raid-5 and raid-6
2Ability to import raw devices from other NAS, SAN, disk arrays
3Some people have commented that its closer to multiple terabytes, but still waiting for documentation.
4Support raw volumes, for database and apps that need a chunk of storage
53002.pdf System Design for an NFS File Server appliance describes a limit of 255, but other have stated other wise.