With the ever-increasing amounts of data storage requirements, IT managers are running out of floor space to house it all. In fact, in a Storage Magazine’s recent survey, seventy-one percent of respondents indicated that “Managing rapidly growing capacity requirements” is their biggest problem.
Typically we see overflow racks creeping into corners of the employee kitchens or even the proverbial closet once reserved for coats and umbrellas. But believe it or not, I recently heard of a Data Center manager who had resorted to using “roof-top storage” for his burgeoning storage need. Yes, I mean literally moving some of his data storage to the roof of his building! (Kind of gives a new meaning to “Storage in the cloud”, doesn’t it, Pete?)
At this rate, could this really be that far off in the future? With the advent of durable, weather-resistant, storage containers like PODs (Portable On-Demand Storage), is this a reality for housing our archived or nearline data and if so — what will a storage array look like that needs to operate in this kind of environment?
Looking for another option? Try the 2.5-inch hard drives (Constellation for nearline environments) and increase your space savings by 70% over traditional 3.5-inch hard drives. (And you’ll gain on power & cooling efficiencies at the same time)
Running out of room in your data center? Let us know what options you’re looking at for your next rack?
