We’ve already talked about some of the common pain points around managing archive storage, but not all storage is not all doom and gloom. Archive data can provide a tremendous amount of value, and with efficient and powerful Nearline archive data solutions, the benefits of archive data are tenfold.
More and more often, the value of a business is being defined by the data they have. That data can include what you know about your customers, how you route your logistics or how to build your products. But for many industries, most of their archive data is unstructured, so it’s hard to find what you need in a timely way. Nearline storage offers our customers the structure and performance they need for their archive data. That can be a tremendous help to many organizations, including those that create vast amounts of data for:
Nearline Storage Solution Keeps Costs Down for Sequencing Archive Data
When sequencing genetic data, researchers working on the next potential scientific breakthrough analyze for specific patterns in their data. Due to the sheer volume of data involved, legacy Nearline storage solutions are so costly that many researchers throw away the raw data and only keep samples as archive data in case they need to do any analysis again. When that happens, they have to pay more for reagents and computer resources just to put the samples through the DNA sequencing process again. This can be quite expensive. On top of that, researchers pay the price of time spent reanalyzing old samples.
Scientists and researchers could take note of the 1U form factor that is favored by cloud providers for Nearline storage solutions. With this approach, organizations can save on valuable aspects of their data center like rack space, HVAC, power and networking. With the right Nearline storage system in place, researchers can feel confident in keeping their raw data.
Nearline Storage Gives Studios the Scale They Need
In movie production, it is not uncommon to need access to the digital assets again after the movie is made. The reasons can vary: a sequel could be ordered, a video game tie-in could be created, or a studio might want to just create some cool stickers for a mobile chat application. When this occurs today, it means a studio artist has to ask the IT help desk to restore the needed files. The administrator then has to comb through their backup catalog and request the needed tapes from the archive. Once the tapes arrive, they need to copy the data to some storage location where the artist can work with the data. This process can take weeks, and if it turns out an additional file is needed, the whole project can take much longer. What a pain.
Stories like these make it clear that archive storage solutions need a make-over. A modern Nearline storage solution can act as an intermediary between primary and backup systems. By providing scalable performance and capacity, Nearline storage solutions can help media studios create the next Hollywood smash hit.
Nearline Storage Gets Important Archive Data to Doctors, Faster
Medical imaging has revolutionized healthcare and resulted in an explosion in data growth. Combine that with HIPAA requirements for long-term data retention, which can be decades, and you find yourself in a position where you need a system that is able to handle the amount of data, while still controlling costs. Picture Archiving and Communication System (PACS) images can be viewed by many doctors, in many different locations and are often reused to find the cause of an injury or get historical information about a patient’s medical history.
Modern PACS systems require the ability to quickly identify data, read the associated metadata and provide lifecycle management. When the data goes to the cold stage, for compliance storage, the service-level agreement for recovery isn’t as time sensitive, but it still needs a performant tier if there is a health issue on the line or to meet a litigation request. Simply buying the lowest cost storage will not meet the healthcare provider’s needs. With the right Nearline storage solution, doctors can quickly and efficiently give their patients the treatment they need.
The Nearline Storage Solution for your Archive Data
There is no question that businesses can get value from their data long after the initial project is completed. What still is left to be answered is how those companies can store that data so when they need it, it is quickly and easily accessible.
It’s time for traditional archive to make way for a new generation of Nearline storage solutions that deliver scalable performance with better hardware efficiency. And with a file system that delivers inherent efficiency over legacy systems while scaling to billions of files.
