Practical IT Research that Drives Measurable Results Mitigate Costs & Maximize Value with a Consolidated Network Storage Strategy

Info-Tech Research Group2 Introduction: The Paradox of Consolidated Network Storage Consolidated network storage makes more efficient use of storage resources through the elimination of waste and effort duplication across distributed islands or silos of direct attached storage. Consolidated storage is also a strategic enabler that forms the foundation for server consolidation and a unified approach to data and system availability and recovery. However, unlike server consolidation, where consolidation of workloads on fewer servers leads to capital savings, storage consolidation can lead to more capital costs for the array and network gear. Costs per terabyte of storage also tend to increase, rather than decrease, with scale. To ensure that the consolidated storage is appropriate to core needs and that the investment boosts storage value, this solution set will help you do the following: Decide what network storage type meets core needs Compare TCO per Terabyte across storage options Make the case and move to vendor selection. StrategizeCompareSelect

Executive Summary Info-Tech Research Group3 The cost of consolidated storage should be appropriate to the business value of what is being stored. Tiered storage needs to be thought of in terms of service tiers rather than distinct tiers of architecture. Decide which options provide good enough service to be your primary tier. Map capabilities of storage to core needs of the enterprise The appropriateness assessment tool provides 8 questions to help define the storage requirements for the consolidated network storage and suggests the kind of storage that is generally to be the best fit for needs. Assess the type of storage that is the best fit with strategy Features, such as snapshots and replication, will increase the value of storage; however, they will also increase the cost per terabyte of available storage. Other features, such as disk thin provisioning and data deduplication, improve utilization of available storage, lowering the relative cost per terabyte stored. Assess how various storage features boost value or reduce cost Storage TCO (including key cost drivers such as maintenance and support) is a more important consideration than upfront capital costs. Divide the TCO of storage by the real capacity to find the total cost per terabyte of storage solutions. Calculate the Total Cost of Ownership per terabyte stored Use Info-Tech’s Storage Acquisition Business Plan (see slide 39) to build out a cost justification for your consolidated storage purchase. Justify investment by storage value for meeting core needs

Roadmap Strategize Compare Make cost per TB of storage = value per TB of storage Select Make a strategic business case for storage consolidation Evaluate storage features against cost per terabyte Compare TCO across storage options Proceed to the vendor evaluation and product selection Clarify core needs for consolidation Evaluate capabilities of storage types Decide what storage type best meets core need

Storage strategy is about selecting appropriate storage to meet strategic goals at lowest cost; it’s not a day at the races! Too often selecting networked storage is seen as a feeds-and - speeds contest (a day at the races) – line up the various solutions and then pick the one that is the fastest. But raw performance (measured in input/output per second or IOPs) is only one measure of a storage solution, and performance comes at price. The type, configuration, capacity, and cost of consolidated network storage needs to be appropriate to the business value of the data being stored and/or the business processes being enabled. A strategy starts with a clear understanding of the strategic goals of storage consolidation. Performance needs to be appropriate or “good enough” to enable strategic goals. Next look at how various types of storage can best serve those key strategic goals. Decide what storage type best meets core needs Evaluate capabilities of storage types Clarify core needs for consolidation

Start with clear goals of what you hope to achieve through storage consolidation. What do you need the storage for? In the past Info-Tech found that infrastructure consolidation and improved backup have been the main drivers for storage consolidation. Info-Tech’s most recent survey found that server consolidation was the most often cited factor in terms of critical importance followed by improving backup. Different priorities will be met by different kinds of storage at different price points. Typical strategic goals include: Enable server consolidation including support for virtualized infrastructure. Provide a central platform for faster and more effective replication and backup of system images and enterprise data. Expand capacity to meet rapidly increasing requirements to store unstructured data (e.g. documents). Provide high performance storage for large stores of frequently changing structured data (e.g. databases). N = 93 72%

Storage consolidation is the primary enabler behind any virtualization or infrastructure consolidation initiative LAN Backup LAN Backup VirtualizedServer VM Disk redundancy as well as data volume replication, snapshots, and backup applied to the consolidated storage can benefit all attached servers. With consolidated networked storage, storage is separated from processing islands and consolidated. Processing islands can be moved, consolidated, and virtualized separate from their storage. Distributed processing involves distributed islands of processing and storage that need to be managed separately with separate capacity for each “island” as well as separate backup for each island.

Consolidated storage is an enabler of server consolidation and should ideally precede server consolidation and virtualization. This is often not how it happens in practice. Typically early stage server virtualization and storage consolidation are triggered not by a consolidation strategy, but as part of a server refresh. The following is a typical scenario: A company starts with the desire to replace 12 to 20 end-of-life servers. In discussions with a server vendor, the options for virtualization are explored. Specifically, the enterprise considers purchasing two or three powerful virtualization host servers to host applications on virtual machines instead of 12 to 20 individual physical boxes. In exploring virtualization solutions, such as VMware or Citrix XenServer, the company comes to realize that a SAN is required to provide high availability, rapid deployment, and dynamic provisioning for virtual servers. The SAN can also be used to provide a consolidated backup environment for both virtual and non-virtual servers to improve overall availability and recoverability. Provisioning Virtualization: A typical consolidation scenario

Consolidate storage for efficient capacity management and resource scalability The Problem In a distributed processing environment, each processing node (server & workstation) traditionally has its own attached storage. This distribution of storage is ultimately inefficient. Across all these silos of storage some storage may be close to maximum capacity while other storage may be underutilized. Excess capacity in one silo cannot easily be shared with another silo. The Solution Consolidate all storage in a central storage array that is accessible via a storage area network. All the servers are provisioned with the storage they need from the central pool. Utilization is optimized. No storage is wasted in inaccessible silos. Size of allocated storage can also be varied dependant on need.

Consolidate storage for high availability & disaster recovery In a distributed direct attached storage environment tactics for system availability and data recovery are fragmented across the storage silos. To ensure a certain service level across 100 stand-alone servers, for example, requires 100 schemes for disk redundancy, data replication and backup. Consolidated storage disk redundancy, data replication, and backup for the one array, or cluster of arrays, benefits all servers that are attached via the network. Using volume snapshots, for example, server storage can be backed up off line with minimum service interruption to the server. LAN bandwidth usage is also minimized as backups no longer traverse the LAN from each host server. Replicating the entire array from one site to another can form the basis of site-to-site failover for disaster recovery as well as off-site backup capability. Caution: Consolidation also means that the storage array becomes a single point of failure for all attached servers. To ensure safety of all eggs in one basket, the array has to have significant built-in redundancy, which adds to the cost of the solution. The ProblemThe Solution Consolidated networked storage, and its often built-in management tools, can be used as a way to solve problems associated with the difficulty of backing up and recovering fragmented silo storage.

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