How to plan a scalable storage strategy
Midsize companies produce so much data these days that finding a place to put it all is a challenge. Here's advice on the technology you'll need to keep pace.
In summary:
| • | Direct-attached storage, network-attached storage, and storage area networks are today's three main storage technologies. |
| • | Your strategy should include solutions for handling both file-level and block-level data. |
| • | Storage technology also includes disaster recovery and storage management systems. |
With data volumes growing exponentially these days, the only certainty about storage is that you're eventually going to need more of it. "Everyone ends up running out of space," observes Ryan Peterson, director of intelligent facilities at Data Systems Worldwide Inc., a Microsoft Gold Certified solution provider based in Woodland Hills, California. "It's just a matter of when."
 | No matter what system you deploy today [it's] guaranteed that two years from now there's going to be a system that's cheaper and offers more capacity. |  | | Richard Villars
IDC
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In fact, midsize businesses plan to increase their storage spending by 10 percent in 2008, according to Cambridge, Massachusetts-based analyst firm Forrester Research Inc. To play it safe, it's a good idea to adopt scalable, long-term storage strategies that can accommodate years of future growth. Fortunately, there are now quite a few options to satisfy that need.
Understanding storage technologies
Three technologies dominate the storage landscape: direct-attached storage (DAS), network-attached storage (NAS), and storage area networks (SANs):
DAS solutions, as the name suggests, attach directly to an individual server.
Organizations typically use them either to supplement the server's built-in disk drive or to store backup data. DAS systems are inexpensive and easy to install, but you must manage storage for every server separately. With prices steadily falling on more sophisticated technologies, DAS is rapidly losing favor in the IT world.
NAS solutions connect to your network rather than a server, so they can support multiple servers at once. Like DAS solutions, they're also easy to use and reasonably priced. Numerous storage vendors make affordable NAS appliances. Software-based options such as the storage operating system, Microsoft Windows Storage Server 2003, let you convert ordinary file servers into NAS devices equipped with rich supporting software. However, though high-end models hold several terabytes of data, NAS solutions tend to offer less disk capacity than SANs.
SANs are centralized data repositories that essentially replace the hard drives on your servers. Currently the most scalable storage technology, SANs are also the most complex and costly. In a SAN-equipped infrastructure, you use servers only for processing; all of your data resides on the SAN. Uncoupling processing and storage this way helps you manage your company's data centrally and efficiently, instead of supporting dozens of independent, underutilized hard drives in separate locations. Most SANs use either iSCSI or Fibre Channel "interconnect" technology to link servers and storage devices. Fibre Channel SANs are faster, but also more expensive and difficult to setup, as they require special cables. SANs using iSCSI run on existing network infrastructure; simple solutions suitable for a midsize company's budget are available for under $20,000.
Building an appropriate solution
Which storage technology is right for your business will vary depending on your industry or sector, number of employees, and how much data you generate. An entry-level NAS system may work well for a 100-person manufacturing firm with a single branch. Bigger organizations with multiple locations generally need more sophisticated solutions, as do companies in data-intensive industries such as financial services and healthcare.
Every storage strategy, however, should address both file-level data, such as Microsoft Office Word documents, and block-level data, such as the information in a Microsoft SQL Server database. NAS solutions are often a more cost-effective way to store file-level data, while SANs are generally better for block-level data. As a result, many midsize companies use NAS and SAN systems in tandem. To simplify these hybrid storage strategies, many storage vendors now offer devices that combine NAS and SAN in a single chassis. Such products have the same disk capacity limits as stand-alone NAS solutions, but are more economical than buying NAS and SAN technologies separately. They also reduce the number of separate storage devices you must manage in your data center.
Adopting a "tiered" storage strategy is another wise way to increase efficiency. At most companies, employees spend most of their time working with the roughly 10 percent of files that are less than 90 days old, observes Richard Villars, vice president of storage systems at Framingham, Massachusetts-based analyst firm IDC. Smart companies keep those files on speedy, high-performance storage hardware and place everything else on less expensive systems, Villars notes.
Whatever strategy you adopt, though, implement it gradually, advises Ashish Nadkarni, a principal consultant at IT infrastructure consulting firm GlassHouse Technologies Inc., of Framingham, Massachusetts. One of the advantages of scalable storage solutions is that you can start slowly and buy additional capacity only as needed.
Other storage strategy components
A complete storage strategy should also address these critical issues:
Disaster recovery: Safeguarding you company from data loss requires specialized software and hardware. Applications such as Microsoft System Center Data Protection Manager can help you replicate data to a variety of tape-based and disk-to-disk (D2D) backup systems. Tape-based systems are cheaper, but slower at saving and restoring data. D2D solutions are faster and more reliable, but costlier and less portable. For maximum safety, make certain to store backup data both onsite and offsite. Companies that can't afford a standby data center should use an online backup service, or simply store tapes or removable hard disks (RHDDs) in a secure offsite location. Always encrypt backup data before taking it out of the office.
Management: Most NAS and SAN solutions come with built-in management software, but such systems all work differently. A centralized storage management console, such as the Virtual Disk Service in Microsoft Windows Server 2008, lets you control all of your storage assets through one interface.
People: A comprehensive storage strategy will require new skills, so be sure to reserve funds for training. A Microsoft Certified Partner can help with training, and can also assist with implementation, if you need to deploy complex storage technology such as a Fibre Channel SAN.
Finally, don't forget to consider future migration requirements. "No matter what system you deploy today [it's] guaranteed that two years from now there's going to be a system that's cheaper and offers more capacity," Villars says. Progressive IT executives always buy storage products that make exporting data onto new platforms easy. After all, even a scalable storage strategy needs an exit plan.
 | Rich Freeman is a Seattle, Washington-based freelance writer specializing in business and technology. He has more than 14 years of strategic marketing and communications experience in the IT industry. |
