DELL STORAGE CONSOLIDATION SOLUTIONS

DELL COURSE

STORAGE CONSOLIDATION

Storage consolidation: process by which data is migrated from on-server and

direct attached storage into a single scalable pool of storage that is centrally
managed and protected.

Why storage consolidation has become such a compelling strategy for companies?

1. Virtualization: The trend towards virtualization drives applications and other

processes off physical servers. This logically involves the consolidation of
data, especially application data, but also file and data logs. Virtualization
drives unique storage requirements that cannot be optimized through DAS or
typical SAN solutions.

SAN: Storage Area Network

A storage area network (SAN) is a dedicated network that provides access to consolidated, block level
data storage. SANs are primarily used to enhance storage devices, such as disk arrays, tape libraries,
and optical jukeboxes, accessible to servers so that the devices appear like locally attached devices to
the operating system. A SAN typically has its own network of storage devices that are generally not
accessible through the local area network by other devices. The cost and complexity of SANs dropped in
the early 2000s to levels allowing wider adoption across both enterprise and small to medium sized
business environments.

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A SAN does not provide file abstraction, only block-level operations. However, file systems built on top of
SANs do provide file-level access, and are known as SAN filesystems or shared disk file systems.

DAS: Direct Attached Storage

Historically, data centers first created "islands" of SCSI disk arrays as direct-attached storage (DAS),
each dedicated to an application, and visible as a number of "virtual hard drives" (i.e. LUNs). Essentially,
a SAN consolidates such storage islands together using a high-speed network.

2. Complexity: Critical business applications and workflows now tend to involve

multiple systems, the internet, various databases, multiple layers of
middleware, networking and storage. The consolidation of storage makes
these operations more efficient and safer. As IT budgets and resources
become more constrained, storage consolidation minimizes more
management time, hardware costs, as well as multi-vendor complexity.
3. Diversity: there has been a trend towards application diversity as business
operations rely increasingly on specialized applications. This has created an
explosion of application data and high level of interdependency of datasets.
4. Management efficiencies: as IT resources and the data they generate grow,
the model of server-dedicated storage becomes less viable to manage with
backup and other tasks requiring IT administration.
5. Security and Compliance: the percentage of data requiring information
security will rise considerably.
So, business find themselves in a situation where they have a data explosion,
coinciding with the legal need for total data integrity driven by compliance
requirements. Doing nothing to change your approach to storage is no longer an
option.

How can storage consolidation can benefit me?

1. Maximize my disk utilization: using shared storage solutions it is possible to

dramatically increase disk resource utilization. Consolidation also optimizes
your buying strategy and minimizes budget impact since you only need to
buy storage when you really need it.
2. Access my consolidated storage
Network protocol: storage consolidation via SAN can be based on either the
ethernet based iSCSI protocol or Fiber Channel protocol. The choice of
protocol is governed by performance requirement and cost. Fiber channel
gives the highest performance but ethernet based iSCSI is often chosen by
those with a tighter budget.
3. Make sure my storage is right for my data:
Is my storage right for my data - Block or file?
- Block/Structured data: is typically created and managed by
applications. Examples of this would be Transactional data and
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Accounting systems. These have typically been stored on servers,

Direct Attached Storage (DAS) or Storage Area Networks (SAN).
- File/Unstructured data: is typically created and managed by users.
Examples of this include documents, images and media files. These
have typically been stored on servers, direct attached or network
attached storage. However the purchase of separate storage systems
for file-based data has created independent silos of equipment
straining both IT resources and budgets.

Dell has storage systems that can manage both block and file data on the same
system unified storage.

4. Keep my scheduled downtime to a minimum.

Off server backup: by taking the storage off servers it is possible to reduce
the time it takes to perform daily operational backups, and therefore reduce
their performance impact. Doing this also makes backup more efficient as
administrators dont need to perform each server backup independently.
5. Keep my data safe.
Offsite recovery, File and App
Data replication: snapshot and remote replication performance can be
dramatically improved through storage consolidation, since these processes
are now operating across a pool of storage rather than specific volumes of
file shares. Plus, the process can be automated to ensure that there is always
a recoverable copy of application and file data should it be needed.
6. Be able to efficiently scale.
Consolidating storage allows for the addition of disks volumes within the
storage array, or the addition of a new array, when demand dictates. Thin
provisioning can be used to allocate storage flexibility between user groups
based on needs at any given time. This keeps storage expansion efficient and
utilization levels high.
Disks can be added when needed and data can be re-striped automatically
across these additional volumes for performance. This creates virtualized,
scalable and readily managed storage to meet the companys needs.
7. Maximize my return on investment.
Storage arrays allow you to install drives of varying performance and prices,
from high performance solid state disks (SSD), through Serial Attached SCCI
(SAS) drives to the lower performance, higher capacity Serial ATA (SATA) or
Nearline SAS drives.
This means that you can host your most important data on the higher
performing disks and your less critical data on lower performing disks all
within one array. This approach is called Automate Tiering and it helps
maximize your return on investment as you only have to pay the technology
premium for the data that needs it.
Some of the DELL storage platforms include automated tiering to
automatically move less frequently accessed data to lower-performing disks.

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DELL solutions to help business plan for implement storage consolidation

Network
Protocols

Data Replication
& Snapshots

Files & Blocks

Dell Stor Arr Primary

& Unif Block & FS

Expansion
Tiering data

Dell Storage Arrays for Primary & Unified Block & File Storage

- Fluid data architecture

a. PowerVault MD and NX series
Affordable, entry level storage delivers value and performance with
easy upgradability.
Designed for consolidation without complexity to deliver a versatile,
adaptable feature set.
The MD series is a versatile family of storage solutions it can scale
up to 180 hard drives, store up to 540 TB of data, and support Fiber
Channel, SAS and iSCSI protocols.
b. Equal Logic PS (Primary Storage) and FS (File Storage)
The award winning of virtualized iSCSI SAN and NAS are
uncomplicated, versatile and ideal for growing environments. They are
designed to minimize Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) and optimize
virtual storage consolidation.
c. DELL Compelled Storage Center and FS Systems
Multi-protocol enterprise storage which is self-optimized and powerful,
delivers performance and protection to power business critical
workloads.
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Expansion

PowerVault, EqualLogic and Compellent can all scale up and scale out easily
and non-disruptively, without any downtime or interruption in service.

This allows you to scale performance and capacity and accommodate growing
storage needs without forcing a platform rip-and-replace.

Serverless backup

Data backup is taken from the central storage pool. Server backups are
achieved with no server burden by taking a snapshot of the server through
iSCSI to the storage, and running backups from there. This approach is far
quicker and less disruptive.

High levels of integration with Microsoft, VMware, CommVault and Dell Data
Protection offerings Quest NetVault, Quest vRanger and AppAsure means
more efficient backup and data protection. This minimizes the burden on
your servers and give more free time back to your IT staff to focus on value-
add activities.

Network Protocols

Dell has solutions that address SAS, Fiber Channel, iSCSI and FCoE (Fiber
Channel over Ethernet)

Data Replication and Snapshot

Replication in computing involves sharing information so as to ensure consistency between
redundant resources, such as software or hardware components, to improve reliability, fault-
tolerance, or accessibility.

Point-in-time replication - introduces periodic snapshots that are replicated instead of primary
storage. If the replicated snapshots are pointer-based, then during replication only the changed
data is moved not the entire volume. Using this method, replication can occur over smaller, less
expensive bandwidth links such as iSCSI or T1 instead of fiber optic lines.

Auto-replication comes as a standard on EqualLogic and Compellent systems

and is optional on PowerVault systems. With this you can point-in-time
replication when you want, including to remote sites. This is delivnered in a
solution that is affordable and easy to deploy and use.

PowerVault, EqualLogic and Compellent solutions offer both asynchronous

and synchronous replication. Well cover the differences in a later module.

File or Block which data type?

Dell now offers Unified Storage Systems in a NAS appliance form factor that
are pre-integrated to support Dell PowerVault, EqualLogic and Compellent

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storage arrays in order to support both block and file storage from a single
platform.

The system use Dells Fluid File system for the optimal combination of
performance and scalability.

Tiering data

Automated Tiering helps to increase storage utilization and reduce storage

costs by up to 80% by automatically moving inactive data to less expensive
drives.

PowerVault allows you to combine drive types to create tiered-storage

environment. EqualLogic and Compellent the latency levels of data reads and
writes to trigger automated load balancing and tiering which moves data to
the array drive types better suited to the IOPS activity levels of the data.

Summary

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