PURE STORAGE DATA STORAGE ASSOCIATE
EXAM SCRIPT 2026 COMPREHENSIVE EXAM
Q&A STUDY GUIDE
◉ Availability of pure storage arrays? Answer: 99.9999%
◉ How often do pure arrays phone home with metadata for Pure1?
Answer: Every 30 seconds
◉ SLA for Sev 1 incidents? Answer: 15 min
◉ Support level when call in? Answer: L2 instant
◉ Multipath settings Answer: Round Robin, Single IO per path, 2
paths per host for each controller
◉ UNMAP Answer: Regularly run to free deleted blocks on
virtualized storage after volumes have been destroyed, reclaim
space
◉ How are controllers able to upgrade non-disruptively? Answer:
They are Stateless
,◉ How many shelves can you add to an M10? Answer: Zero
◉ M50 Max capacity Answer: 20-176TB
◉ M50 Usable capacity Answer: up to 500TB
◉ Components of NVRAM Answer: DRAM, Supercapacitors, flash
◉ How NVRAM works in flash for power outages? Answer:
Capacitors give it enough battery to write data to persistent flash
◉ Benefits of Pure NVRAM Answer: all in one, no battery packs,
cables, UPSs
◉ How does the RAM talk to the controllers? Answer: NVMe
◉ RAID-HA Answer: prevents data loss from read errors, minimizes
read error recovery
◉ FlashBlade connections Answer: 8x 40G or 32x 10G
,◉ How do you scale Flash Blade Answer: Scale Out
◉ Min FlashBlade configuration? Answer: 7 Blades
◉ Max FlashBlade configuration? Answer: 15 Blades
◉ Blade compute component Answer: Intel system on a chip
◉ Blade storage technology Answer: directflash
◉ blade memory Answer: NVRAM
◉ SDN networking speeds? Answer: 40G
◉ SDN total bandwidth Answer: 320G
◉ Where can you receive alerts other than the dashboards? Answer:
Emails, SNMP
◉ How can support get access to your array through phone home?
Answer: Admin creates a secure direct link that can be closed at any
time
, ◉ How many volumes can you analyze in the GUI at a time? Answer:
Up to 5
◉ Where in the GUI can you find latency, IOPS, Bandwidth, capacity?
Answer: Analysis > Performance
◉ Where to analyze a specific volume? Answer: Subtab on
performance page
◉ Calculation for bandwidth Answer: block size x IOPS
◉ How long is it required to transfer data from the initiator to the
array? Answer: Milliseconds
◉ Average arrival to completion time for reads Answer: Read
Latency
◉ Average arrival to completion time for writes Answer: Write
latency
◉ Sum of writes from hosts to volume pods Answer: Mirrored Write
Latency
EXAM SCRIPT 2026 COMPREHENSIVE EXAM
Q&A STUDY GUIDE
◉ Availability of pure storage arrays? Answer: 99.9999%
◉ How often do pure arrays phone home with metadata for Pure1?
Answer: Every 30 seconds
◉ SLA for Sev 1 incidents? Answer: 15 min
◉ Support level when call in? Answer: L2 instant
◉ Multipath settings Answer: Round Robin, Single IO per path, 2
paths per host for each controller
◉ UNMAP Answer: Regularly run to free deleted blocks on
virtualized storage after volumes have been destroyed, reclaim
space
◉ How are controllers able to upgrade non-disruptively? Answer:
They are Stateless
,◉ How many shelves can you add to an M10? Answer: Zero
◉ M50 Max capacity Answer: 20-176TB
◉ M50 Usable capacity Answer: up to 500TB
◉ Components of NVRAM Answer: DRAM, Supercapacitors, flash
◉ How NVRAM works in flash for power outages? Answer:
Capacitors give it enough battery to write data to persistent flash
◉ Benefits of Pure NVRAM Answer: all in one, no battery packs,
cables, UPSs
◉ How does the RAM talk to the controllers? Answer: NVMe
◉ RAID-HA Answer: prevents data loss from read errors, minimizes
read error recovery
◉ FlashBlade connections Answer: 8x 40G or 32x 10G
,◉ How do you scale Flash Blade Answer: Scale Out
◉ Min FlashBlade configuration? Answer: 7 Blades
◉ Max FlashBlade configuration? Answer: 15 Blades
◉ Blade compute component Answer: Intel system on a chip
◉ Blade storage technology Answer: directflash
◉ blade memory Answer: NVRAM
◉ SDN networking speeds? Answer: 40G
◉ SDN total bandwidth Answer: 320G
◉ Where can you receive alerts other than the dashboards? Answer:
Emails, SNMP
◉ How can support get access to your array through phone home?
Answer: Admin creates a secure direct link that can be closed at any
time
, ◉ How many volumes can you analyze in the GUI at a time? Answer:
Up to 5
◉ Where in the GUI can you find latency, IOPS, Bandwidth, capacity?
Answer: Analysis > Performance
◉ Where to analyze a specific volume? Answer: Subtab on
performance page
◉ Calculation for bandwidth Answer: block size x IOPS
◉ How long is it required to transfer data from the initiator to the
array? Answer: Milliseconds
◉ Average arrival to completion time for reads Answer: Read
Latency
◉ Average arrival to completion time for writes Answer: Write
latency
◉ Sum of writes from hosts to volume pods Answer: Mirrored Write
Latency
