Storage Virtualization Outlook: More functional cloud and storage pools

There is no doubt that virtualization has changed the face of Datacenter Center. Virtualization means less hardware, lower costs, and higher it efficiency, and virtualization, the technology and its benefits, begins to penetrate other areas of the data center. We've heard and seen many server virtualization, while storage virtualization is becoming a mainstream data center. Here, let's discuss why storage virtualization is also important for small and midsize enterprises, while we look at the status of storage virtualization and how it will change over the next few years.

Important Technology

Kathleen Ferraro, vice president of product management and marketing at F5, says data growth management is a challenge for all size companies, but the problem of data growth management is particularly acute for small and medium-sized enterprises. "The data growth faced by small and medium-sized enterprises and the level of problems associated with data growth are similar to those of large enterprises, but small and medium businesses have much less it budgets and human resources." Storage virtualization can help these companies reduce the cost of unit storage capacity and simplify many of the data management tasks that are currently consuming their limited IT resources. "

Falconstor Software marketing vice President Fadi Albatal says storage virtualization as a cost-sensitive medium and small sized enterprise provides a way to consolidate resources, create more efficient environments, and ultimately reduce it costs. "Once virtualized merged storage environments are ready, IT managers can deliver a range of differentiated storage services, including data protection services, such as backup and replication for disaster recovery, based on significantly reduced costs," Albatal said. "

changing technology

Srinivas Ramanathan, founder and CEO of EG Innovations, said that from the perspective of changing storage virtualization patterns, he believes that storage virtualization will take the path of server virtualization. Ramanathan explains: "A few years ago, the focus of server virtualization was still in virtual Machine Manager." Now, virtual Machine Manager has become a commodity. All virtualization companies are focused on manageability to provide cost savings and agility for virtualized customers. In my opinion, after a few years, storage virtualization will also go into the maturity of server virtualization. "

Although server virtualization has become mainstream, Ramanathan represents a certain distance from the mainstream of storage virtualization. "The main focus now is proving that the technology is effective," he says. In a few years, manageability will be more important-how to make the most of existing hardware, how to dynamically migrate VMS (virtual machines) on different hosts. "

Galvin Chang, deputy director of Infortrend Marvell, says the first phase of storage virtualization is the ability to consolidate and process I/O commands from different vendors ' storage hardware. The following issues will become more important in the next phase of storage virtualization: Scaling out storage, tiered and virtualized storage, virtualized storage for cloud data centers, and load balancing, Chang says.

According to Chang, the use of up-scaling storage in a virtualized environment can only increase capacity and cause unnecessary waste of resources; only scaling out the schema will improve storage performance and gain the benefits of virtualization. (For more information about extending the store externally, see the introduction to out of storage on the sidebar). Chang also says that virtualized storage can provide different levels of storage management services, including SSD, SAS, SATA, and even VTL (Virtual tape libraries).

As for cloud service requirements, Chang believes that virtualized storage can offer different benefits, including scalability, data management without downtime, and lower costs. He says another key issue will be how to balance the controller workload and host bandwidth when multiple storage controllers introduce a virtualized storage pool. "Vendors can deploy smart host proxies or use network layer protocols for load sharing," Chang said. "

Technology and trends

What are the hottest technologies and trends associated with storage virtualization today? According to F5 's Ferraro, duplicate data deletion and cloud storage are two objects of concern. "As data continues to grow fast, many companies are looking for ways to further reduce storage costs," she says. Storage virtualization is one of the key factors in these technologies because it eliminates the major obstacles to their application. Storage virtualization automates the process of determining which data is appropriate for which storage types, and can migrate data based on predefined policies without interfering with users and applications. "

According to Albatal, some of the new technology trends that are noteworthy include heterogeneous virtual storage environments, the same quality data protection services, improved SAN (storage area Network) performance, SSD applications, and automated data migrations on storage architectures based on QoS (quality of service) requirements. "Storage virtualization can be widely used in the IT world as a best practice," he says. Virtualized sans will be the de facto standard for deployment and management of storage environments. "

Albatal says SMEs are expected to see more heterogeneous storage virtualization solutions and support for new protocols, such as Fibre Channel Ethernet, which delivers high-performance services on IP.

In Ramanathan's view, many people will focus on where virtualization is deployed-host-based, network-based, or based on storage. "All of these options have their own strengths and weaknesses," he says. Many people emphasize that storage virtualization merges heterogeneous storage systems, merging these systems into a common storage pool and adopting common management and protection. The goal of storage virtualization is to give you the ability to choose a storage array for different vendors, providing you with a variety of enterprise-class capabilities, such as dynamic configuration and Dynamic Data migrations. "

(Responsible editor: admin)