March 2008 Archives

HYDRAstor uses a two-step inline process to deduplicate data. Two or more Accelerator Nodes may see the same file at the same time. However, Accelerator Nodes only have a part of the information required to do deduplication and do not maintain the entire global deduplication index. So the Accelerator Nodes chunk up each file into small chunks, eliminate as many duplicates as possible and then send the remaining chunks to the Storage Nodes. (read more)

The primary reason that many deduplicating appliances create data silos is that they are based on the traditional dual-controller storage system architecture. Dual-controller storage systems typically use two clustered servers that sit in front of a fixed pool of storage. The NEC HYDRAstor functions as one logical storage system regardless of how much performance or capacity a company adds so it can globally deduplicate all company archive or backup data stored on it (read more)

Deduplicating appliances have gained mindshare with users because it makes disk as cheap, or cheaper, than tape by delivering data reduction ratios of 15:1 or more while expediting backups which solves their short term backup problems. However companies also need to consider, when selecting a deduplication product, how well it will best serve them in the long term. The capability to globally deduplicate data is very powerful, but most deduplicating storage appliances are limited in scope to just that one appliance. (read more)