“Software-defined” is really about leveraging the power of the Intel CPU to do things in software that we used to do with dedicated hardware. The upside of this method should be more rapid deployment of capabilities and functionality. It should also lead to lower development cost for the vendor. The downside of counting on the host CPU to execute flash management functions is that it could impact flash and/or host performance when under stress. The advantages of hardware-based flash management may become more apparent in the future, at least for today they are a wash.”]
Source: https://www.darkreading.com/database-security/should-you-use-software-defined-flash-storage-