Access "Why consolidate?"
This article is part of the Vol. 2 No. 6 August 2003 issue of How storage managers can survive e-mail archiving
The ultimate benefit of consolidation Consolidated storage and storage teams can provide standardized services. Deploying this utility model focuses on storage as a discrete discipline and standardizes service offerings around a few designated choices. Rather than selecting vendors and products per application, you can create standards that can apply to multiple applications. Other benefits may be illusory. Take staffing, for example: Don't expect to magically reduce your staff. Organizations looking to size their storage management teams often want to know: "What is the right amount of terabytes managed per administrator?" Not so long ago, the conventional answer was 1TB per full-time equivalent (FTE). Since then, manageability has improved tremendously and storage density has continued to grow, so many now claim 3TB or 4TB per FTE. Whatever the number, though, this metric is almost entirely arbitrary and really shouldn't be used at all. Focus instead on the tasks performed by staff. Make sure someone is looking at the needs of business users, while others ... Access >>>
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Early Adopters Unequivocally Up About iSCSI Arrays
After years of listening to iSCSI hype, some IT professionals are embracing a new generation of IP-based storage subsystems, a group that includes the PeerStorage Array 100E, an iSCSI array from Nashua, NH-based EqualLogic.
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SRM Vendors Set Sights on Secondary Storage
Storage resource management (SRM) has become a standard offering for primary storage from all of the major SAN management vendors. Now, a number of startups and established backup software makers have taken the features of SRM and aimed them at secondary storage.
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New Pricing Schemes Aim For Lower Storage Costs
Could pay-for-use pricing save you money?
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Diagnostic Tool Shines Light on SDLT
Quantum is shipping a suite of drive and media diagnostic tools that the company says will help IT managers more easily manage their tape resources.
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Intelligent Switches To Get Common API
Smart switches to be standardized
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Can tools streamline provisioning?
Virtualization was last year's buzz word, and it looks like provisioning may be this year's. We dissect what these tools actually do and how to choose which ones that are likely to actually be useful in your environment.
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Why consolidate?
Organizations trying to consolidate storage often find themselves creating SAN islands that perpetuate traditional stovepipes. Does this solve the problem?
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Early Adopters Unequivocally Up About iSCSI Arrays
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EMC Expands Reach of Symmetrix DMX
The incredible expanding Symmetrix DMX
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Grid computing will change storage
Often described as the Internet on steroids, grid computing has the buzz as the next big thing to change the world of computing as we know it. Here's how storage management will change in the grid world.
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Guest Opinion: IBM Makes the 'V' Word Respectable Again
IBM makes virtualization respectable again.
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Protect your SAN from attack
by W. Curtis Preston
Think your SAN is secure? Find out the truth by reading Part 1 in our three-part series on storage security.
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File Virtualization Tackles NAS Management Woes
Now that NAS farms have grown to multiterabyte proportions, management migraines usually associated with SANs have arisen, and virtualization--round two--has begun.
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The best way to scale SANs
by Stephen Foskett
SAN configurations greatly influence their scalability. There's no perfect model, but here are the trade-offs involved with each major option.
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E-mail: It's worse than you think
by Eric Knorr
According to a 2003 study by Meta Group, 80% of businesspeople say e-mail is more essential than the telephone. However, storage managers are struggling to keep pace with the growth in message volume and retention requirements. however.
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EMC Expands Reach of Symmetrix DMX
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Columns
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Recovering from a data center disaster
by Darryl Brooks
Your worst nightmare -- of your data center suffering a catastrophic disaster -- has come true. Now what?
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More cool technology coming out over the next year than at any other time in storage history
Storage Bin: Summer thoughts: There's more cool technology coming out over the next year than at any other time in storage history.
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Getting started with data storage efficiency
Don't get stuck in the old mode of consolidation and miss opportunities for greater efficiency.
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Do you encrypt your backup tapes?
Do You Encrypt Your Backup Tapes?
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Editorial
by Mark Schlack
After the winter, what to plant?
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Recovering from a data center disaster
by Darryl Brooks
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