Increasing demand of visual content is driving organizations to create more and more videos. It’s not at all uncommon for studios to have several terabytes of primary storage capacity consumed by raw footage and multiple versions of project files. The capacity one consumes will only increase as one move into higher-resolution formats, such as 1080p and 4K, which generate larger file sizes.
Storing all the content in primary storage is not possible as the cost to buy and operate are not minor. In addition to the cost, one ends up paying for ongoing power, cooling, real estate and administrative costs which will easily cost to thousands. Adding storage tiers is the first step in accommodating content growth. By offloading files from primary storage to more cost-effective tiers—such as object storage, data tape, or the cloud—one can optimize utilization of your more expensive tiers, gain workflow efficiency, and save money.
Defining the Requirements for Data Management
A data management platform should combine intelligence, flexibility, visibility, and efficiency. When an editor changes job or leaves a project, it makes difficult to decide what content should be offloaded from our primary storage. Even in normal scenario, linked files can be stored on multiple systems. Moving the wrong files can make it extremely difficult to restore projects later. But, leaving files behind reduces your available capacity and could force one to add drives unnecessarily. In addition to choosing which files to move, one need to decide where to move them. Object storage lets one maintain near-immediate access to files while enhancing resiliency and reducing costs compared with primary storage. Digital tape offers an even more cost-effective solution for long-term storage, although your team might have to accept a slight delay in retrieving tape-archived files. A cloud archive can help protect content off-site, but regularly moving a large number of video assets to and from the cloud can be time consuming and expensive.
An intelligent data management platform enables one to match the right files with the right storage tier at the right time. Your platform should provide:
- Intelligence: Policy-based management capabilities allow one to set data migration rules based on the frequency files are used, the time elapsed since projects are completed, and other criteria.
- Flexibility: Your data management platform must support a full range of storage technologies—from flash arrays to object storage, digital tape libraries, and cloud services. It also must support all of the operating systems and applications that your team members use.
- Visibility: Your team should be able to browse and locate all of the files that might be associated with a project, whether those files are on primary storage, object storage, digital tape, or the cloud.
- Efficiency: Files should be easy to retrieve— without IT assistance. An editor shouldn’t have to get help from an IT administrator to find physical tape cartridges on a shelf, pulling the IT administrator away from other tasks and forcing the editor to wait hours or days to get content.
Enabling Intelligent Content Movement with Quantum Stornext
StorNext can help support growth and control costs with intelligent content movement among multiple storage tiers.
QuantumStorNext data management software is intelligent, efficient, and flexible content movement across multiple storage tiers while enhancing visibility into that content. One can also accommodate rapidly rising volumes of video while optimizing performance, facilitating collaboration, and controlling costs.
- POLICY ENGINE- Want to have an in-built policy engine that allows one to set rules for intelligent data movement among storage tiers? Then, StorNext has covered it. One can set a policy that will be copied from primary storage to your data tape archive. If the file is not touched, the original file will be truncated- leaving only a small pointer to the archived file. A user searching the file later will find the pointer to find the file to be offline. Policies can also be set to help maintain compliance with internal or external content retention rules.
- DATA MOVER- The data mover transparently copies and moves your content among storage tiers according to the policies that is being set. The content is local to the application accessing the file system. If an archived file is requested by the editor, the data mover presents the file within the file in such a manner that the file was there in the primary file system.
- SINGLE NAMESPACE – When a single namespace is created in the storage environment, StorNext makes it easier for users to access files no matter where those files are located. The team members get the visibility to view and search the entire storage including primary, secondary, tape and cloud tiers.
- SHARED FILE SYSTEM – StorNext also provides a high-performance shared file system that delivers efficient, low-latency access to files across tiers. Multiple users can efficiently retrieve and use files regardless of the file location. Your team members have the flexibility to use their preferred applications running on Mac, Windows, or Linux client systems.
A software like Quantum StorNext can help support growth and control costs with intelligent content movement among multiple storage tiers. And at the same time, Quantum’s data protection solutions can encrypt data from the moment it is backed up until expiration, using hardware-based, military-grade encryption, so that your data is as secure as can be.
By: Jim Simon, Vice President of Global Field and Channel Marketing, Quantum Corp
