DEFINING THE FUTURE

SOFTWARE-DEFINED STORAGE PROMISES TO HELP YOU REALISE BUSINESS VALUE FROM DATA. HERE IS HOW TO GET STARTED.

The premise of softwaredefined storage is simple – decouple management software from the underlying hardware, which gives administrators the flexibility to provision and manage storage with automated policies.

It enables enterprises to unify all storage assets into a single infrastructure and manage it with a single pane of glass, solving data fragmentation and meeting changing business requirements. No wonder then Gartner predicts 50% of global storage capacity will be deployed as SDS on-premises or in the public cloud by 2024.

Charbel Zreiby, Director, Channel Presales – MERAT, Dell Technologies, explains why businesses should choose SDS: “The evolution of storage media has produced a wide array of options, yet many of these current generation storage solutions fall short in their ability to support the needs of nextgeneration applications. From big data, social, mobile and cloud computing to robotics, 3D printing and the Internet of Things, new technologies require storage media that delivers more speed, flexibility, scalability and capacity.

“IT teams are also facing pressure to constrain costs and to get more done with existing resources. Software-defined storage solutions satisfy the requirements for performance, flexibility, scalability, ease of use and cost efficiency by separating the management services (control plane) from the infrastructure (data plane) of storage media while still delivering equivalent and at times better data services vs traditional storage arrays.”

Paulo Pereira, Senior Director, Systems Engineering, METI at Nutanix,

says there are multiple benefits of adopting software-defined storage that are pushing more businesses to choose a hardware-neutral approach to storage. Businesses that have adopted SDS enjoy much-needed advantages in everything from costs to scalability.

“Because SDS can be used with an x86 server, businesses realize improved flexibility when it comes to selecting IT managers, eliminate vendor lockin challenges, and far more. Without question, SDS is an economical storage option for businesses hoping to reduce their CapEx expenditure,” he says.

Ayman Al Shaikh, Director Solutions Architecture, MENA and Pakistan, Red Hat, offers another perspective: “To keep pace with business requirements, organisations need modern storage solutions that are optimised for most types of workloads. Software-defined storage solutions help you work more efficiently, grow faster, and rest easy knowing that your data—from important financial documents to rich media files—is available and stored safely. SDS solutions empower businesses from all verticals, offering them automation, flexibility, scalability, and transparency, as well as standard interfaces and a virtualised data path.”

Saifuddin Khwaja, Senior Sales Director at Western Digital, says traditional data centre infrastructure is declining as more spending and workloads go to the cloud and new infrastructure choices. As organisations contend with the never-ending tsunami of data, more and more IT leaders are turning toward cost-effective softwaredefined infrastructure, like SDS or HCI, to manage the complexities of storing, accessing, sharing and protecting data at scale.

How does SDS work?

Software-defined storage virtualises the management of storage requests, not the IT hardware storage boxes. Functions such as replication, automated provisioning, deduplication, and backup can be virtualised.

“Unlike traditional network-attached storage (NAS) or storage area network (SAN), software-defined storage enables system optimisation and the ability to update to the latest storage management features without having to purchase additional resources,” says Steven Carlini, Vice President of Innovation and Data Center, Energy Management Business Unit, Schneider Electric.

As more businesses begin to decentralise their data processing, moving it closer to where their data is generated via edge computing, storage simplicity and flexibility are critical. Software-defined storage enables a simplified edge deployments with lower-cost storage clusters that are powerful enough to support on-site applications and data, he adds.

Khwaja from Western Digital says SDS technology is often deployed using standardised, off-the-shelf hardware that delivers all the features of robust storage arrays at new cost efficiencies through a data plane. However, the advantages of software-defined storage go far beyond economics as it provides organisations with a new level of flexibility.

Components can be tuned to fit particular needs; resiliency and

Charbel Zreiby

Paulo Pereira

Saifuddin Khwaja

Steven Carlini

TO KEEP PACE WITH BUSINESS REQUIREMENTS, ORGANISATIONS NEED MODERN STORAGE SOLUTIONS THAT ARE OPTIMISED FOR MOST TYPES OF WORKLOADS. SOFTWARE-DEFINED STORAGE SOLUTIONS HELP YOU WORK MORE EFFICIENTLY, GROW FASTER, AND REST EASY KNOWING THAT YOUR DATA—FROM IMPORTANT FINANCIAL DOCUMENTS TO RICH MEDIA FILES—IS AVAILABLE AND STORED SAFELY.

features are delivered through software rather than hardware; and the system can be far more easily maintained and upgraded through software enhancements.

“SDS is defined in two parts: infrastructure and management. Infrastructure SDS is what most of us are familiar with and utilises commodity HW such as x86 servers, JBOD, JBOF, or other and delivers features through software orchestration. Management SDS, on the other hand, controls above hardware but also controls legacy storage products to integrate them into an SDS environment,” he says.

Like any other new technology, SDS has its fair share of disadvantages too. Compared with off-the-shelf solutions, new SDS deployment can be cost prohibitive, and it requires solution engineering.

Walid Issa, Senior Manager, PreSales and Solutions Engineers - Middle East and Africa, NetApp, says software defined storage has many benefits to address the challenges of today’s data centres; However, some may see it as complex and therefore could increase administration overhead. Data availability and Security may also be a concern.

“Therefore, a data recovery and disaster recovery strategy must be designed and implemented properly. So, having the right technology to move and replicate data easily with consistent management across the hybrid cloud environment is key to address these challenges. Also, be able to dynamically add capacity and scale performance to meet changing business needs without administrative complication,” he says.

Zreiby from Dell says as SDS systems are Data Service rich that could involve more functionalities, it’s normal that another risk could be human error. On these same lines, new data structures in SDS systems can lead to defects such as physical disk failure due to the complexity of the solutions. However, this can be avoided by setting up an elaborate data protection strategy that includes data recovery and a robust backup plan.

Pereira from Nutanix says cuttingedge software is always challenged by legacy apps and the complexity due to compatibility issues with legacy features and slow pace of development when it comes to legacy applications. And while offering flexible licensing model, by separating the software-defined storage from the underlying hardware, customers usually face two different types of license and support, unless the solution is provided as appliance based.

“SDS is still maturing to fulfill all needs, and there are many different options to choose from. We are moving into a hybrid world with hybrid tiers, hybrid clouds, and hybrid solutions that take advantage of these new models. With the onslaught of data, growing performance demands and need for unprecedented cost efficiencies comes an essential requirement to understand your storage usage and how you manage both legacy and new systems on-premise and in the cloud,” sums up Khwaja.