Data storage professionals are under constant pressure to efficiently and safely manage data that is being generated at an exponential rate while keeping costs as low as possible. While there are many data management solutions, organizations that have implemented a hierarchical data management strategy have seen significant Cost Savings with Tiered Storage.
When determining the data management strategy or solution that best fits your organization’s needs, you must first consider the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for each solution. The topics to take into account include:
- Hardware & software costs
- Power consumption
- Floor space
- Service level agreements
- Planned & unplanned outages
- Installation
- Training
Cost Savings with Tiered Storage is obvious when analyzing these topics for each solution. To keep costs at a minimum, Tiered Storage takes into account: price, performance, capacity and functionality for each data type located on each tier. Data that requires high performance and availability should be stored on more expensive, high performance media that requires more power. However, data that is not accessed regularly should be stored on less expensive, lower activity media that does not consume power.
Question: Does archival data need to be stored on extremely expensive high-performance disk arrays?
Answer: No
Archival data is important and is typically 43-60% of the data being stored by an organization but it does not require instant access. By moving data between high-cost disk media and low-cost tape storage media, an organization can experience an acquisition cost reduction of up to 67%. Chart 1.1, below, demonstrates the large cost reduction of utilizing 4 tiers vs. only 1 or 2. Not only is the organization saving on media costs but also on infrastructure and energy costs.
By considering TCO when it comes to data storage, it is clear that Tiered Storage is the most cost effective model.
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