Hard disk drives keep getting bigger, meaning capacity just keeps getting cheaper. But storage capacity is like money: The more you have, the more you use. And this growth in capacity means that data is at risk from a very old nemesis: Unrecoverable Read Errors (URE). Let's get one thing out of the way from the start: The only thing protecting your data from corruption … [Read more...] about Why Big Disk Drives Require Data Integrity Checking
NTFS
The Four Horsemen of Storage System Performance: Get Smart
Why do some data storage solutions perform better than others? What tradeoffs are made for economy and how do they affect the system as a whole? These questions can be puzzling, but there are core truths that are difficult to avoid. Mechanical disk drives can only move a certain amount of data. RAM caching can improve performance, but only until it runs out. I/O channels can be … [Read more...] about The Four Horsemen of Storage System Performance: Get Smart
Microsoft Adds Data Deduplication to NTFS in Windows 8
The next version of Microsoft Windows Server includes integrated data deduplication technology. Microsoft is positioning this as a boon for server virtualization and claims it has very little performance impact. But how exactly does Microsoft's de-duplication technology work? Introducing Windows 8 Deduplication Let's make one thing clear right from the start: Microsoft … [Read more...] about Microsoft Adds Data Deduplication to NTFS in Windows 8
Back From the Pile: Interesting Links, January 7, 2011
It's been a slow week (the holidays) and a crazy one. I've started pouring out the thin provisioning series, with 10 posts so far, as well as launching a new video "talk show" about enterprise IT. And I've got a new post over at SearchStorage, too. Whew! My State of the Art Thin Provisioning series Storage is Not Getting Cheaper Thin Provisioning: Attacking Storage … [Read more...] about Back From the Pile: Interesting Links, January 7, 2011
Monitoring Filesystem Metadata For Thin Provisioning
I began by introducing the core problem: Storage isn't getting any cheaper due to storage utilization and provisioning problems. Thin provisioning isn't all it's cracked up to be, since the telephone game makes de-allocation a challenge. So now let's talk about how to make thin provisioning actually work. There are 100 different ways of solving the de-allocation problem, … [Read more...] about Monitoring Filesystem Metadata For Thin Provisioning