Storage Effect

Storage performance specs are so last millenium  

Going by today’s headlines, storage vendors should add a new spec to their data sheets: hackability.

Case in point: yet another theft of reams of customer data, this time in the UK.  Tapes left in a car.

Wired Magazine’s Fetish spread features the Maxtor BlackArmor drive from Seagate.   This is a new kind of extreme storage device.  It’s virtually unhackackable, offering AES encryption encased within the hard drive itself.  So if it gets stolen or lost (does it matter which?), you can sleep secure in the fact that someone else may have your drive, but they don’t have your data.

It’s got a high “eye candy” factor, too - so you can be safe AND cool.

Update: CDW is taking orders for BlackArmor now.

There’s more than one way to seed the storage clouds for profit

Storagezilla doesn’t think Amazon’s got a winner with their cloud storage business. 

Label me a Cloud Believer.  The long-term money-making details may still be unclear for Amazon, but others are raking in the profits on cloud storage.  Take Google, for instance.

Google’s not a thriving cloud storage company?  Au contrair! 

Google has nailed the Cloud concept with a Library model.  I “check out” my data when I need directions to a hip restaurant or insight on the curative properties of a green-lipped mussel.  Meanwhile, Google’s bookshelves keep expanding. Very profitably, I might add.

Maybe that’s what happens when you start out by selling books…everything looks like a book store.

I’m sure Jeff Brazos and team will get there with time.  And they won’t be the only ones!

Who out there is paying someone to keep their information?  What do you like about your service?  What needs to be fixed?

I counted:

• Home PC (500GB)
• Office laptop (100GB) - upgraded from 40GB
• Home backup (500GB)
• Office local backup (500GB)
• Tivo (80GB) - it’s getting long in the tooth
• 2 mobile drives (~80GB each) - I rotate copies of my home data and keep them at work. Presto! Remote storage.
• Pocket drive (6 GB)
• Video camera (40GB)
• Update: forgot about my 2006-era iPod (8GB)
• and my kids’ 8-yr old PC (40GB?)

My company bought some of these on my behalf.

That’s 9 11 drives for me.  How many do you own?

Even best-in-class rebuild times expose data to hours of risk

Blocks and Files points to an Demartek study (sponsored by Pillar) showing that the Pillar Axiom 500 rebuild times are much shorter on high capacity arrays that similar EMC or NetApp systems.

The glaring data beyond Pillar’s performance, though, is the teeth-clenchingly long times that data is one drive failure away from catastrophic loss in every case. 

The tests were conducted with about 50 500GB drives per system using RAID 5 (RAID 4 for NetApp), meaning the arrays can be rebuilt if one drive fails, but not two.  So during the rebuilds of from 3 to 23 hours, if another drive fails, all data is lost. 

Insert 1 TB drives into the equation, and your rebuild time (and vulnerability) doubles.

RAID 6 and other dual-failure protective schemes make this problem go away, but cost a little in capacity. 

How are you dealing with this?  I’ve heard that RAID 6 is gaining traction for 7200 rpm high capacity enterprise drives like Seagate’s Barracuda ES that are less reliable than 15K SAS enterprise drives (see Seagate’s 3.5″ Cheetah and 2.5″ Savvio for reference). 

Does your RAID vary by drive class?  What other magic do you apply to make this work?

Widespread video consumption will bring the next billion within five years 

It’s a proud day for Seagate. 

Today the company announced it has shipped its one billionth disk drive. There’s a fun video stroll through the 29 years of Seagate’s existence on the website.  I was in high school for drive #1- it seems like just yesterday!

More amazing: the 2 billionth drive will ship within 5 years.  How can that be, given how capacious drives are today? 

One word: video.  There are several interlocking trends driving the sustained explosion in content needing to be stored in our world, but video rises above all else in explaining it.  I posted on this not too long ago.

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New ideas for storage may be changing how we buy bytes

Curious about the mysterious ISE from Xiotech?  A picture paints a thousand words, and a video does it all the better.  Here’s a fun peek of the ISE at SNW from Robin Harris, coincidentally generating 48 simultaneous video streams.  Oooh!  Aaah!

It’s energizing to see conventional disk drive technology turned on its head to provide dramatic new value.  It goes to show that innovation is limited not by technology but by its application. 

Atrato is another innovative take on ‘black box’ storage - keep an eye on them as well.

Potential risk for IBM competitors currently using Diligent’s product

Byte and Switch  is referencing Israeli media reports that IBM has acquired Diligent for $200M.  The deal’s been talked about in the blogosphere, including here, for a few weeks now. 

Deduplication is an important enabling technology for the data center. Diligent, EMC’s former Israeli lab, is a dedupe leader.  It’s not clear what this will mean for IBM competitors HDS, Sun and Overland that are licensing Diligent’s technology today.

There may be a bit of scrambling as the music stops on the dedupe round of techno musical chairs.

Digital Rights Management requires rock-solid data security in the infrastructure

Atrato’s been making waves with their innovative approach to performance for content serving applications.  Now they’ve announced that they are working with Seagate to add full disk encryption (FDE) to provide compelling data security to the solution. 

Secure data is a clear need for customers in the business of content distribution.  Their product is basically bits and bytes.  Without bullet-proof security, these guys risk a “pay if you want to” message to this developing market. 

The rules of engagement for Digital Rights Management are still taking shape.  Atrato’s capabilities will be a valuable tool for those trying to influence the future to carve out a profitable and sustainable business model in this space.

Comments?  Is this a killer product for media companies or just interesting technology?

Korea is out front in adopting the digital lifestyle

My colleague in Korea pulled out his cell phone and extended an antenna.  “Terrestrial and satellite TV transmission. See?” 

They don’t make a big deal about it, but the Koreans I met here in Seoul are proud of the fact that they are a world leader in adopting digital technology.  Other proof points: ubiquitous 3G cellphones, wireless HD video streaming and downloads, and a lot of DivX-based video recording.  

It shows in their storage use as well.  Lots of 500GB and larger drives are used to stash movies, pictures, camera footage.  But especially video. 

Koreans upload more video than anyone other than the Chinese, Brazilians and Spaniards.  Their tools of choice are peer-to-peer sites.  It reminds me of Napster before the litigation, with video instead of music.

One downside to the Korean digital lifestyle: people are glued to their cellphones even more than in the States. 

You may feel life like your life has changed dramatically due to technology.  Hold on to your hat - Korea is proof that there’s more to come.

Saw this shop in the new Roppongi Hills complex in Tokyo:

I’ve pretty much ceded all of my personal “search” business to Google. And I’m happy with that decision.  I trust the Google brand as my number one virtual guide to…well, anything I need to find. But seeing their logo on a real world storefront kind of gives me the heebie jeebies. 

Google soda?!

The iGoogle Art Cafe is a limited engagement gig.  But moves like this by the Googleplex beyond the information market seem ill-considered to me.  Even Google needs to know its limits.  

Comments?  How do you feel about the Google brand?