Tips

Tips

• A case for 8 GB Fibre Channel

  Since 4 GB Fibre Channel (FC) was introduced, there have been significant changes in data centers, including server virtualization, a focus on power and cooling, and the rapid acceptance of solid-state disk (SSD). These factors, combined with the ...  Continue Reading

• Storage area network options for SMBs

  While many SMBs are increasingly looking to deploy a storage area network (SAN), many experts agree that a full-scale deployment could be overkill. This tip takes a look at the various storage area network options that are available for SMBs.  Continue Reading

• Choosing a midrange network-attached storage (NAS) system

  Midrange network-attached storage (NAS) appliances can be an affordable solution for SMBs in today's do-more-with-less economic climate. Learn how to choose the NAS system that best fits your storage environment.  Continue Reading

• Wide stripe before you dive into SSD

  Storage managers should consider physical disk technologies before plunging into SSD for storage IO performance. One of the processes existing vendors provide is called wide striping. It's most often available inside storage subsystems from 3PAR, ...  Continue Reading

• Fibre Channel SAN versus iSCSI SAN: Reliability and performance

  Buying a new block-based storage array can be tough decision for data storage managers at SMBs. In this first part of our series on Fibre Channel and iSCSI storage area networks (SANs), we'll compare the reliability and performance of these ...  Continue Reading

• Fibre Channel SAN versus iSCSI SAN: Cost and scalability considerations

  Buying a new block-based storage array can be tough decision for data storage managers at SMBs. In the second part of our series on Fibre Channel and iSCSI storage area networks (SANs), we will discuss the cost and scalability considerations of each...  Continue Reading

• How to determine a NAS system's scalability

  This tip covers scalability limitations of a network-attached storage (NAS) system, including maxed managed file limits, IOPS and throughput limits, and capacity limits. It can help you avoid application outages that occur when storage reaches ...  Continue Reading

• Pros and cons of storage capacity management tools

  Learn what storage capacity management tools can and can't do by looking at the operational problems they're attempting to solve.  Continue Reading

• iSCSI vs. Fibre Channel for SMBs

  Deciding whether to use iSCSI or Fibre Channel to build your storage area network (SAN) can be crucial to effectiveness of the implementation. This tip discusses the pros and cons of iSCSI and Fibre Channel in the SMB market.  Continue Reading

• How to evaluate and purchase a SAN

  The Royal Horticultural Society's network manager Martin Taylor guides users through the process of evaluating and purchasing a SAN.  Continue Reading

• The pros and cons of solid-state drives for notebook computers

  A solid-state drive (SSD), like the name suggests, consists of flash memory, similar to what's in USB flash drives or Secure Digital media cards. This tip discusses the The pros and cons of solid-state drives in an SMB environment.  Continue Reading

• Secure DAS without breaking the bank

  Whether you're using direct-attached storage (DAS) for primary data storage, backups or archiving, there are a ton of security issues affecting storage confidentiality, integrity and availability. Here are four DAS security issues SMBs can't afford ...  Continue Reading

• What are the key differences between SATA II vs. SATA I?

  New SATA II-based drives will make their way into the enterprise because of three features: port multipliers, port selectors and native command queuing.  Continue Reading

• Considerations when selecting a data storage VAR

  Data storage for SMBs has moved beyond basic email and data files to include increasingly larger file formats like podcasts and video streams. In this tip, Martha Young outlines considerations SMBs should make when selecting a data storage VAR.  Continue Reading

• High performance computing demands special backup approach

  For storage administrators, the increasing popularity of HPC servers translates into unique backup challenges.  Continue Reading

• How to choose a SAN switch for SMBs

  Storage environments in SMBs can range from a few servers and a couple of terabytes, to hundreds of servers and hundreds of terabytes. In this tip, Greg Schulz discusses some of the features to look for in a SAN switch in iSCSI, FCl, FCoE or ...  Continue Reading

• Do you really need NAS?

  There are no short, hard-and-fast rules when it comes to determining if a small to midsized business (SMB) needs network-attached storage (NAS). In this tip, Tory Skyers discusses the advantages and disadvantages of networked storage in an SMB ...  Continue Reading

• Getting started with data deduplication

  When it comes to data storage, many small to midsized businesses (SMBs) have requirements similar to those of larger firms. This tip answers the questions that SMBs should be considering when getting started with data deduplication.  Continue Reading

• Secure your iSCSI storage

  A Fibre Channel (FC) storage-area network (SAN) is physically no more secure than an iSCSI one; it's just far more difficult to get to. In this tip, Mark Arnold discusses best practices for small to midsized businesses (SMBs) to secure their iSCSI ...  Continue Reading

• MAID and other energy-saving storage technologies for SMBs

  The cost to power and cool data storage gear is eating up IT budgets. In this tip, Daniel Dern discusses eight ways that small to midsized businesses (SMBs) can keep storage energy costs down while addressing potential impacts on response time, ...  Continue Reading

• The pros and cons of thin provisioning

  Most storage area networks (SANs) have a section in their marketing material entitled "Thin Provisioning," but what is it, how does it work and why does it matter? In this tip, Mark Arnold discusses how thin provisioning can help with both the ...  Continue Reading

• How SMBs can ensure storage security

  With minimal time and a small budget, many small and midsized businesses (SMBs) often struggle to achieve reasonable information security. In this tip, Kevin Beaver discusses the keys areas that SMBs can address to ensure data storage security.  Continue Reading

• How does content-addressed storage differ from backup?

  The term content-addressed storage (CAS) refers to systems that store data in such a way that an object cannot be duplicated or modified once it has been stored. In this tip, Russ Fellows discusses how CAS differs from backups and how this ...  Continue Reading

• Troubleshooting SAN performance issues

  SAN troubleshooting is tough because good design is not always obvious and Fibre Channel standards make interoperability a concern. This tip will review some common problem areas with SANs, describe how to diagnose problems and offer some ...  Continue Reading

• Tiered storage for SMBs

  If an SMB hasn't already deployed an iSCSI SAN or NAS filers, they're probably about to. This tip discusses how SMBs can increase the cost savings of consolidating storage by implementing tiers of storage instead of throwing everything on the same ...  Continue Reading

• Moving from DAS to NAS

  As the volume of data and the number of users in SMBs grow, direct-attached storage (DAS) becomes harder to manage. In this tip, Rick Cook discusses how SMBs can benefit from adding storage to their existing networks in the form of NAS.  Continue Reading

• Data storage security issues for SMBs

  Federal compliance is as complex for the SMB as it is for the large enterprise. This tip discusses how your business can implement a secure business and technology storage environment to ensure it meets the required standards.  Continue Reading

• How to boot from a SAN

  Not too long ago, the idea of storing a server's operating system on the SAN was treated with skepticism. Now, with the growing adoption of iSCSI storage, some SMBs moving to networked storage are reconsidering having their servers boot from shared ...  Continue Reading

• Data protection for virtual server environments

  The loss of a physical server that supports multiple virtual machines can have a very significant impact on SMBs and all of the applications supported on those servers. Check out this tip to learn how your business can re-architect its data ...  Continue Reading

• How to consolidate NAS boxes

  By now, we all know that network-attached storage (NAS) can provide benefits for small-midsized businesses (SMBs). However, managing more than a few NAS devices quickly becomes a burden, swapping the value out of NAS simplicity. This tip discusses ...  Continue Reading

• Data footprint reduction for SMBs

  For SMBs wanting to address green storage issues, as well as data management issues, establishing a holistic data footprint reduction strategy is a must. This tip discusses how your business can address these issues while boosting overall data and ...  Continue Reading

• Determining the number of drives in a RAID group

  How many drives in a RAID group will it take to give you the performance you need for a database or email or file server, or for that new VMware implementation?  Continue Reading

• Determining the right SAN protocol

  Which transports and protocols should you use in your SAN? Here are suggestions on when to use iSCSI, Fibre Channel and InfiniBand.  Continue Reading

• Is clustered NAS for SMBs?

  Clustered storage is not just for large enterprises. This tips explores how clustered network-attached storage (NAS) can be leveraged in the small-midsized business (SMB) market.  Continue Reading

• What you need to know before implementing NAS clusters

  Now that we've examined the reasons why clustered NAS is getting more popular with storage managers and dispelled the biggest myths about clustered NAS, you're almost ready to deploy a clustered NAS solution. But first you have to know what ...  Continue Reading

• Five ways to control RAID rebuild times

  Hard disk capacities are rapidly increasing, and so are RAID rebuild times. This article offers five tips for keeping RAID rebuilds reasonable.  Continue Reading

• Top considerations when buying a NAS array

  Purchasing a NAS platform for your organization requires careful consideration. This article outlines the most important things to consider before making a decision.  Continue Reading

• How to create an RFP for NAS

  Creating an RFP will help you boil your NAS vendor choices down to a manageable few. And your NAS RFP should include one technology: thin provisioning.  Continue Reading

• Tips for creating LUNs

  LUNs are the cornerstone of a server's relationship with its attending storage platform. This article details what you need to consider when creating LUNs.  Continue Reading

• NAS system planning strategies

  Implementing a NAS environment requires a lot of planning. This tip tells you why location, power and allocation are vital to consider when installing a NAS.  Continue Reading

• RAID tutorial: Picking the right RAID level

  While there are multiple variations of RAID available today, only six levels actually matter for SMBs. Marc Staimer discusses how to choose the right RAID level for your business based on the application data type, the criticality of that data and ...  Continue Reading

• How to size a SAN

  If your DAS storage infrastructure has reached its limits, or your existing SAN is out of date or just plain end-of-life, your first step will be to know what your storage requirements are.  Continue Reading

• SAN or NAS?

  Determine whether implementing a storage area network or network-attached storage is right for your business.  Continue Reading

• Five questions to ask a VAR before buying an iSCSI storage array

  Here's five questions you should ask a value added reseller before purchasing an iSCSI storage array.  Continue Reading

• Understanding NAS interconnects: Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet

  Understanding interconnects like Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet, which are used to integrate NAS devices into networks, can help you make better decisions on NAS deployments.  Continue Reading

• Five steps to calculate data storage capacity requirements

  This tip offers five best practices for controlling storage costs with effective storage capacity planning.  Continue Reading

• Why NAS protocols are the language of NAS

  NAS protocols are the language of your NAS system, and understanding how they work is the key to operating a storage network. The main NAS protocols are CIFS and NFS, but iSCSI is gaining ground, and FCoE may be just around the corner.  Continue Reading

• NAS devices remain simple and cost effective

  Despite the lack of some features, NAS continues to gain in popularity because users like the concept of just plugging a device into their Ethernet network and having storage available a few minutes later.  Continue Reading

• How to move from DAS to a SAN

  Here's how to move your data from direct-attached storage to your brand-new storage area network.  Continue Reading

• Can a NAS filer work for your small business?

  NAS filers are a good option for a small business or department that's not worried about expandability and has fairly simple storage management needs.  Continue Reading

• Clustered NAS gaining in popularity

  While clustered storage is often associated with high performance computing, the reality is that mainstream commercial environments are adopting clustered storage, particularly clustered NAS servers, at a rapid rate. These businesses are attracted ...  Continue Reading

• Server virtualization may have big disaster recovery payoff

  The biggest impact of server virtualization may be in disaster recovery, specifically in improving the recovery time of applications that you wouldn't dedicate a standby server to.  Continue Reading

• Leveraging storage replication for VM disaster recovery

  When you're sizing up storage solutions for DR in a virtual environment, you should consider the issues of vendor support; storage architecture; replication options; deduplication; and recovery options.  Continue Reading

• LUN basics

  Greg Schulz outlines what a LUN is and how it is used.  Continue Reading

• Implementing LUNs

  Greg Schulz explains how to create and implement LUNs.  Continue Reading

• How to replace a failed drive in an array

  Rick Cook explains how to avoid replacing the wrong drive in an array.  Continue Reading

• Advanced LUN topics

  LUN migration and other data management topics are addressed in this tip.  Continue Reading

• LUN management

  Expanding and partitioning LUNs is explained.  Continue Reading

• Comparing different backup strategies

  Review the primary options for backup including direct, network and SAN, and determine which solution is best for your backup strategy.  Continue Reading

• Using global spare drives to increase SAN reliability

  Here's a checklist for storage administrators using global spare drives to create a more reliable SAN.  Continue Reading

• How to mitigate the performance penalties of data encryption software

  Learn three tactics that can help you mitigate performance penalties when dealing with data encryption software.  Continue Reading

• How to create a SAN performance baseline

  To understand SAN performance and what is normal SAN behavior, you must have a performance baseline.  Continue Reading

• Tutorial: Creating a tiered SAN architecture

  This tip offers the pros and cons of a tiered SAN architecture, as well as a number of points to consider before creating a tiered SAN.  Continue Reading

• Choosing a low-end NAS product

  Many low-end NAS products are designed for personal or home office use. However, there are some products on the market suitable for certain SMB or enterprise-level applications. Learn what you need to consider before deploying a low-end NAS product.  Continue Reading

• How to reduce response time in a SAN

  When it comes to storage area network (SAN) metrics and measurements, such as bandwith, input/output per second (IOPS) and utilization, more is usually better. However, when it comes to response time and latency (the amount of time it takes to ...  Continue Reading

• Tutorial on solid-state disk (SSD) devices

  Solid-state disk (SSD) devices use much less power and produce less heat than hard disks. But until their prices come down, they'll at best be niche devices.  Continue Reading

• How to choose and implement a NAS aggregator

  Rick Cook details network-attached storage (NAS) aggregator basics, suggests things to consider before implementing a NAS aggregator, and outlines the major players in the market.  Continue Reading

• How to choose an e-discovery tool

  Here is a list of factors to consider when choosing an e-discovery tool.  Continue Reading

• What you should know about iSCSI initiators

  Learn about hardware and software iSCSI initiators and when you should choose each.  Continue Reading

• Ten reasons storage security is critical

  Storage expert Kevin Beaver outlines 10 reasons you need to step up your storage security game.  Continue Reading

• How to reduce risk with storage security policies

  This tip outlines the importance of storage security policies and offers advice on how to make sure your storage security policies reflect real-world storage needs.  Continue Reading

• How to increase your storage energy efficiency

  You can improve your storage energy efficiency by spinning down and powering off disk drives not in use, placing disk drives into a slower mode and using RAID levels and tiered storage.  Continue Reading

• Why you should perform data classification

  Regardless of how daunting a task it may be, understanding the data we store is the first step in addressing data management issues. This tip outlines some of the main reasons why data classification is essential.  Continue Reading

• Using SAS and SATA for tiered storage

  This podcast offers detailed information about SAS and SATA so you can strike the right balance between SAS and SATA in a tiered storage environment.  Continue Reading

• RAID levels defined

  This tip offers a listing of the RAID levels in use today and details the characteristics and applications of each.  Continue Reading

• How to choose the correct RAID level

  This tip offers nine things to consider when deciding which RAID level is right for your organization's needs.  Continue Reading

• What to expect from a storage audit

  This tip outlines the three main types of storage audits, what you stand to gain from each type and offers insight into the audit process.  Continue Reading

• How to secure laptops in seven steps

  This tip outlines seven essential steps for protecting your company's laptops and offers practical advice on what you can do to get beyond the basics and develop a new mindset about laptop security.  Continue Reading

• Laptop encryption the hard(ware) way

  This tip explains the pros and cons of hardware-based laptop disk encryption and offers an overview of products on the market today.  Continue Reading

• Choosing a storage virtualization approach

  This tip outlines three approaches to storage virtualization available today, along with some benefits, caveats and some examples of each.  Continue Reading

• RAID: It's alive

  RAID is still relevant today, possibly even more than in the past. However, it has become a transparent, standard feature that isn't often discussed. This tip outlines the state of RAID today.  Continue Reading

• Look at the big IT picture to ensure storage security

  Though storage administration and information security are often handled by two separate groups, getting storage administrators onboard with storage security can greatly help reduce risk of a breach.  Continue Reading

• Storage virtualization: Where and how

  This tip outlines the various locations to implement storage virtualization functionality, the different approaches to storage virtualization and offers suggestions on how to choose the right approach for your environment.  Continue Reading

• IBM Tivoli Storage Manager pitfalls to avoid

  This tip outlines some of the common issues users encounter in a TSM environment.  Continue Reading

• Storage basics: RAID striping in detail

  How RAID striping improves performance and how parity fits in.  Continue Reading

• Justifying your storage staffing

  Three things to consider when calculating staffing levels to get beyond staffing per terabyte.  Continue Reading

• Five ways to get faster restores

  Never forget that backups don't mean a thing if you can't restore your data. In a rapid-paced environment, a slow restore might not be an option. Rick Cook outlines how to get faster restores.  Continue Reading

• Ten questions to increase storage efficiency

  Rick Cook offers 10 things to consider in order to make the best use of your storage, from simply reviewing your storage strategy to standardizing your hardware.  Continue Reading

• Will SAS and SATA replace SCSI technology?

  Learn where to use SCSI, SAS and SATA drives.  Continue Reading

• Block and file access unite with multiprotocol storage

  This tip looks at the pros and cons, as well as when and where to deploy multiprotocol storage, which is also referred to as "unified" storage.  Continue Reading

• Thin provisioning pros and cons

  Learn how thin provisioning works, as well as its benefits and drawbacks, so you can decide whether it is right for your storage environment.  Continue Reading

• Easing I/O bottlenecks with Microsoft Scalable Network Pack

  Microsoft's SNP is designed to improve performance by easing network and I/O bottlenecks. This tip explains how this new offering works, and what it means for your storage environment.  Continue Reading

• Storage security and the firewall DMZ problem

  Firewalls are often relied upon too much for network security -- especially when it comes to locking down the storage environment. Learn how this firewall demilitarized zone (DMZ) security misconception unnecessarily exposes many critical storage ...  Continue Reading

• Migrating data in NAS gateway configurations

  There are four approaches for migrating data between NAS gateway systems. For storage administrators, the problem is how to maintain data availability during the migration.  Continue Reading

• Storage provisioning best practices

  Storage provisioning can be a tricky practice, especially when you factor in that it needs to be done manually. List here are eight best practices when it comes to provisioning.  Continue Reading

• Top 5 iSCSI tips 2006

  Here are the top five iSCSI tip of 2006, based on readers' interest, covering such topics as iSCSI vs. FC, iSCSI security, and iSCSI SAN options.  Continue Reading

• Four remote replication management musts

  Remote replication isn't cheap. Getting the biggest bang for your buck from replication requires careful management. This tip outlines remote replication management best practices.  Continue Reading

• How to compare Fibre Channel (FC) and SCSI

  Storage expert Greg Schulz offers advice on how to compare Fibre Channel (FC) and SCSI technology.  Continue Reading

• Automated data migration: Choosing technology for ILM

  This tip looks at automated data movement in a tiered storage environment to support ILM; performance and capacity load balancing; compliance; and technology upgrades or replacements. Learn what you need to be aware of when implementing automated ...  Continue Reading

• Multipath I/O: Guarantee redundancy during HBA failure (almost!)

  Microsoft's Multipath I/O (MPIO) is designed to mitigate the effects of a HBA failure, by providing an alternate data path between devices. Learn why MPIO doesn't completely eliminate the possibility of problems if an HBA fails and what you can do ...  Continue Reading