Category: DCIG Sponsored Analysis

Companies are creating more data, storing it on disk and keeping it accessible for longer periods of time than ever before. The problem this creates is that many of the underlying technologies that have powered storage systems for the past 20 years are still being used today even though the capacity and performance of today’s storage systems have largely outstripped the capabilities of these technologies. In part I of this interview series with NetApp’s Vice President of Worldwide OEM Sales, Dave Mooney, we examine how the clock is ticking on decades-old storage technologies which is exposing companies to new risks in their IT infrastructure.

Flash memory arrays almost always win the efficiency and performance battles when compared to hard disk drive storage arrays. It is for these reasons that comparisons between the two need to be redefined to reflect the distinctive features of each. Nimbus Data Systems Gemini breaks new ground with high availability, higher storage density, flash memory endurance and performance as well as new flexibility to configure storage networking ports. Combined these features illustrate how flash memory arrays should no longer be compared to hard disk drive storage arrays and instead be measured by a new set of standards.

Reading through a 30+ page Microsoft Exchange 2010 Solution Reviewed Program (ESRP) report is, at best, time consuming. Trying to objectively compare it against the results of multiple other ESRP reports so one may implement the right storage solution for their Exchange 2010 deployment is, in a word, daunting. So key to properly evaluating these ESRP reports is to know which of the metrics provide insight into how a storage system may perform in a real world Exchange 2010 deployment.

In a little over ten years server virtualization has resulted in organizations virtualizing their application servers in growing numbers. However these same organizations are still coming to grips with the emerging complexities associated with protecting and recovering their newly virtualized applications. Rectifying this requires that companies put in place software specifically tailored for virtual machine (VM) protection that automates and simplifies backup without re-introducing its costs and complexities back into the mix.

Innovation in the file-sync-and-share market segment of cloud storage is being driven by consumer adoption of public cloud storage technologies. Consumers require enhanced features such as versioning, commenting and one-click file sharing with partners, customers and coworkers. Those features are often delivered without regard to enterprise security, storage and system requirements.

Today many enterprises and cloud storage providers ask, “What scale-out storage solution will enable us to economically and easily house our burgeoning Big Data stores?” However small and midsized enterprises (SMEs) put a slightly different spin on that same question by asking, “What scale-out storage system will enable us to affordably address our ‘bigger data’ problems?” SMEs are finding an answer to their question in the form of the Gridstore Scale-out Storage platform.

Private cloud-based infrastructures are becoming a priority for almost every small and midsize business (SMB) as they deliver levels of flexibility, scalability and value that traditional IT architectures simply do not provide. But many of these cloud solutions are still immature and implementing the wrong one may be worse than having no cloud solution at all. The IBM Ready Pack for Cloud changes that by addressing today’s SMB concerns while positioning them for tomorrow’s requirements.

Disk-based backup is unequivocally on the rise in small and midsized businesses (SMBs). But as they transition from tape as their primary backup target, they do not necessarily want to abandon the benefits of tape nor immediately store their backup data in the cloud. Instead they want a product that meets today’s backup requirements while acting as a bridge to get them where they want to be in the future. The new Imation DataGuard backup appliance bridges this chasm.

Choosing the right cloud-based archiving and backup solution may well be one of the most important – and difficult – decisions facing small and midsize organizations in 2012. However a recent acquisition by Imation should contribute to easing which solution organizations should choose in 2012. This acquisition did more than give Imation a cloud-based backup offering. It put Imation among an elite class of providers that offer both local and cloud-based data backup, recovery and archiving options from a single solution.