* Not all data requires the same storage approach
As we wind up our annual Storage Technology Tour, one thing is clear: there is no one storage solution for everyone.
As keynoter Steve Duplessie puts it, you have to match the right storage medium to the right application to the right traffic pattern.
Duplessie, senior analyst at Enterprise Storage Group, says you can have the same storage approach for all the data generated by all your applications, but that would be “economically foolish.” You’d end up spending far more money in storage resources than is necessary.
Instead, he says you have to be savvy in your approach to storing, backing up and retrieving your data. You have to think long and hard about when and where you’ll need to have access to the data. For instance, how soon after a disaster would you need to recover certain types of data. At what time of day will you be doing your heavy storage work? After everyone has left for the day or during peak business hours? Also, are you using high-end systems to back up everyday e-mail – for employees who aren’t even at the company anymore?
While that last part sounds absurd, even representatives from leading storage companies on the tour with Duplessie and I admitted that this is the case in some organizations.
But Duplessie says this all is about to change. As government regulations as well as private sector compliance and accountability hits a high note, he says IT managers must think about their storage across the enterprise and how they would address an audit on mission-critical information. For instance, if they are in the healthcare industry, could they quickly prove that patient records have been adequately protected? What about the financial services industry? Could IT managers in this sector easily produce a log of transaction histories?
At the crux of these audits is how and where the information is stored? Is it on tape in a warehouse somewhere? Is it on a server underneath a desk in the accounts payable department? Or is it scheduled to be deleted every 30 days when regulations say records need to be available for three years?
Duplessie says the considerations go as deep as whether you use Fibre Channel-enabled storage devices or IP-enabled storage devices. Nothing beats Fibre Channel for high-end storage tasks, Duplessie says, but not all applications need that kind of performance. If IT managers map out their applications, they can see that tasks such as e-mail might be able to utilize less expensive IP environments and save money.
The key to any storage environment is to know what the value is on the data you’re storing, Duplessie says.
What do you think? Let me know at sgittlen@nww.com
