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Today’s businesses are dealing with rapid data growth while at the same time trying to improve efficiencies and reduce management costs. Companies need affordable solutions to help them store, back up and manage data without sacrificing key features like scalability, performance and reliability. Now, new solutions are addressing the unique needs of small and mid-sized companies, and enterprise remote offices.
One such solution is HP’s new entry-level external array family. The HP StorageWorks 2000 Modular Smart Array, or MSA2000, helps with storage consolidation through a shared storage environment, using either Fibre Channel or iSCSI connectivity, and provides a simple, affordable way to share, protect and manage data.
The MSA solution can help if:
- You have multiple servers with DAS
- Your distributed storage puts you at risk
- Remote storage is hard to manage
- You have a virtual server environment
Multiple servers with DAS
Managing multiple storage devices individually is time consuming and rarely optimises utilisation. With the MSA2000, you can consolidate storage from numerous servers and have the option to use redundant paths from the servers to provide the required level of data availability. Configuration and system management tools are built in and grow with the system – no hidden costs for growing your data.
Distributed storage puts you at risk
When you store data on multiple disparate storage devices, lack of redundancy increases the risk of data loss and downtime. The MSA2000 has built-in redundancy on every component level, from power supplies and fans to optional dual controllers. RAID 6 provides high fault tolerance and protection from data loss if another drive fails during rebuild.
It also includes optional management software for snap-and-clone capabilities, which are critical for protecting data and streamlining backup and recovery processes.
Remote storage is hard to manage
Some enterprises and mid-sized businesses have replaced DAS at their main locations but not at remote locations, leaving isolated groups of storage with little or no redundancy. Remote locations rarely have dedicated IT staff, making even routine tasks a costly chore.
The MSA2000 doesn’t require extensive IT expertise, nor do you have to configure the array from each server connected to it. A single administrator can manage an office’s entire pool of storage remotely from a web browser.
Virtual server environment
Virtual server technology offers tremendous flexibility and utilisation improvement over traditional servers. However, typical entry-level arrays often have limited scalability, performance and availability, forcing businesses to implement expensive SAN solutions. The MSA2000 offers improved scalability, better capacity utilisation, ease of management and availability – at a cost-effective price point. Companies with a Fibre Channel infrastructure will benefit from Fibre Channel connectivity; another option is iSCSI, which leverages existing Ethernet skill sets.
Successful approach
To solve the IT challenges of mid-sized customers and enterprises with distributed storage, HP has continued the approach it started with Simply StorageWorks: products and solutions designed to help avoid complexity, inefficiencies and data loss. The new MSA2000 is another example of a simple, affordable, reliable solution designed with these challenges in mind.
Microsoft is a U.S. registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
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