Storage Architecture for New Heights
When buildings were all built using bricks and mortar, you could raise them up to a certain height just by stacking more bricks on top. Scaling to greater heights, however, meant not only finding novel building materials to handle the new stresses, it meant developing architecture to support such massive structures.

Currently, data storage is going through such a transition. Storage density has not kept pace with storage requirements. In order to handle the explosive rate of data storage needs, organizations are adding more storage components to their networks.

Originally, all data storage was isolated and connected to each server, like a house with a garage. Networked data storage was a major step forward, like moving from a house to a luxury brownstone apartment building where you can share your neighbors' resources and amenities. This was an advance to be sure, yet in order to handle the skyscraper-sized data storage requirements of today, we need a way to scale our storage to those dizzying heights.

Enter storage grid architecture. Grid architecture provides a framework where you can continue to stack storage as high as you want; however, you don't have to keep climbing higher to access your data. It creates a virtual storage image to make all the storage seem like it is in one place.

With standard storage networking, extending capacity means extending overhead. True scalability has to mean that you can continue to add storage as needed without the handicaps of onerous management, system overhead, and additional retrieval time. Grid storage reduces overhead by organizing data according to how it will be used. This allows you to manage data through your policies for Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) regardless of which component physically holds your data.

The truly remarkable part of the storage grid architecture is that, because of the common platform it provides, you begin your grid with your existing storage. It's like being able to slip a new foundation under your existing house and start building your skyscraper around it. You couldn't write a better TCO equation than being able to incorporate your existing components, add more storage as needed, and still reduce your management overhead.