Book excerpt: This IBM® Redpaper® Product Guide describes the IBM FlashSystem® 9500 solution, which is a next-generation IBM FlashSystem control enclosure. It combines the performance of flash and a Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe)-optimized architecture with the reliability and innovation of IBM FlashCore® technology and the rich feature set and high availability (HA) of IBM Spectrum® Virtualize. Often, applications exist that are foundational to the operations and success of an enterprise. These applications might function as prime revenue generators, guide or control important tasks, or provide crucial business intelligence, among many other jobs. Whatever their purpose, they are mission critical to the organization. They demand the highest levels of performance, functionality, security, and availability. They also must be protected against the modern scourge, cyberattacks. To support such mission-critical applications, enterprises of all types and sizes turn to the IBM FlashSystem 9500. IBM FlashSystem 9500 provides a rich set of software-defined storage (SDS) features that are delivered by IBM Spectrum Virtualize, including the following examples: Data reduction and deduplication Dynamic tiering Thin-provisioning Snapshots Cloning Replication and data copy services Cyber resilience Transparent Cloud Tiering IBM HyperSwap® including 3-site replication for HA Scale-out and scale-up configurations that further enhance capacity and throughput for better availability With the release of IBM Spectrum Virtualize V8.5, extra functions and features are available, including support for new third-generation IBM FlashCore Modules NVMe-type drives within the control enclosure, and 100 Gbps Ethernet adapters that provide NVMe Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) options. New software features include GUI enhancements and security enhancements, including multifactor authentication (MFA) and single sign-on (SSO), and Fibre Channel (FC) portsets.