Gone are the days when you stored your company data in a filing cabinet. From time-saving data recovery processes to solid state drives, you’ll find an impressive array of products, processes, technologies and services designed to keep your data safe and secure until you need it. Discover the latest data storage options to determine which is right for your business.
New Technologies
High-capacity solid state drives (SSDs) are increasingly replacing hard drives (HDD), in part due to their impressive speed. SSDs are almost 100 times faster than HDDs. Because they have no platters or moving parts that can break, they’re also more reliable. Don’t like noisy HDDs? SSDs are much quieter and require less power to run. Intense manufacturer competition means it’s easy to find a small drive with large capacity today. Depending on the SSD you choose, capacity can range from 15 to 60 TB. Although the cost of SSDs has stopped some companies from buying them in the past, dropping prices make them an attractive option.
There’s still a place for HDDs despite the proliferation of SSDs. In fact, they’re a key component of tiered storage automation. In tiered storage, cheaper HDDs and tape drives store data that’s rarely accessed, while SSDs handle more important data. Allocating data manually can be a tedious process. Automating the process gives you more time to devote to more important issues.
Increased Reliance on Cloud Computing
The number of companies that store their data in the cloud continues to grow as more businesses discover the benefits of virtualization. In fact, 93 percent of companies surveyed in RightScale’s 2015 State of the Cloud Survey use a public, private or hybrid cloud. Amazon, Google and Microsoft may be the most well-known cloud providers, but they aren’t the only options anymore. Smaller providers may offer more flexibility for small businesses and are worth investigating.
Hyperconverged infrastructure systems make streamlining cloud integrations easier than ever. The systems use software architecture to integrate virtualization, storage, networking and computing technologies on a single box supported by one vendor.
Data Recovery Trends
Setting specific recovery points may restore the bulk of your system, but there will be holes if you’ve set your backups to occur every four hours or even every hour. Point-in-time recovery (PITR) makes it possible to recover your system seconds before it failed or was hacked. With PITR, a major issue becomes a minor inconvenience.
The cloud also offers significant data recovery benefits. Virtualized servers and networks can be accessed remotely from any location, plus multiple copies of data can be stored in several locations for increased peace of mind. If you’re hacked or experience a system failure, it will only take minutes, not hours, to restore your system.
Although the cloud offers many data storage advantages, problems with backups can still occur in the cloud environment. Vendors are now offering cloud-to-cloud backups to ensure that your backup data remains safe, secure and easily accessible.
Not sure which data storage options are right for your business? We’ll perform a comprehensive analysis of your IT infrastructure and offer suggestions that will improve efficiency, increase security and ensure that your valuable information is available when you need it most. Get in touch with us to get the process started.
Sources:
ITProPortal: Data Storage Trends: The Impact of New Technologies, Regulation and Ransomware
RightScale: 2015 State of the Cloud Report
