New Scalar Storage Platform meets Unstructured Data Challenge

Quantum Scalar Briefing Note

Organizations today face two major issues in dealing with the ever-rising tide of unstructured data. First, where to cost effectively store it. Second, how to ensure proper protection of data from loss and threats such as ransomware. While cloud storage is an attractive option because IT can store massive amounts of data with a low initial entry cost, many organizations are now finding the recurring storage costs and additional fees to access and retrieve data can be higher than their original estimates. Consequently, many organizations are now returning to on-premises storage while borrowing the storage architectures cloud providers use.

Creating a cloud competitive on-premises storage architecture requires a comprehensive storage solution that is easy to use, provides cost effective storage tiers and automates the tasks of data life cycle management. This helps ensure the storing of data on the most cost effective media based on user defined policies. Ideally, the solution should include tape as one of its storage tiers since tape is still the least expensive means to store large amounts of cold data. Tape also provides a secure defense against the threat of ransomware since once data is on tape it is off-line and secure from a network crawling malware. The key is to make tape integration seamless so that its use is transparent to users and for the most part even to the administrators.

Meeting the Unstructured Data Challenge

In addition to a comprehensive portfolio of storage solutions, which are a combination of high performance and data protection storage systems, Quantum Corp.is announcing the release of a new Scalar® storage platform optimized for storing and managing ever-increasing amounts of unstructured data. The first new products based on this platform are the Scalar i3 and Scalar i6 tape libraries, and the StorNext AEL6 Appliance, which is a purpose-built rich media archive appliance. A closer look at the three new models:

• Scalar i3 is a scalable tape library that can store up to 3PB in 12U of rack space and is customer installable. The minimum system size is 3U with a minimum of 25 slots, providing an uncompressed capacity of 150TB. Expansion is available up to 200 slots providing a maximum uncompressed capacity of 1.2PB. The Scalar i3 can hold up to 12 half height LTO7 drives. It also includes Quantum’s iLayer Management Technology that provides proactive diagnostics and advanced reporting capabilities. The starting list price for the Scalar i3 is $8,500.00.
• Scalar i6 is a scalable tape library that can store up to 12PB in 48U of rack space. The minimum system size is 6U with 50 slots providing an uncompressed capacity of 300TB. The Scalar i6 is expandable out to 800 slots, providing a maximum uncompressed capacity of 4.8PB. The library can hold up to 24 full height LTO7 drives.In addition to the iLayer Management Technology found in the Scalar i3, the Scalar i6 also includes Quantum’s EDLM (Extended Data Lifecycle Management) built into the library. This feature works in conjunction with Quantum’s StorNext software and enables the library to monitor tape media based on customer defined scan policies. In the event the Scalar scans detect a degraded tape, it alerts the StorNext software, which in turn copies the data from the degraded tape to a new tape and updates the metadata. This makes the data migration to new media very transparent to the users. The degraded tape is then marked bad and exported from the library. The starting list price for the Scalar i6 is $25,000.00.
• StorNext AEL6 Appliance integrates the Scalar i6 library with StorNext Data Management software. StorNext provides easy access to data on tape with options for CIFS/SMB, NFS and RESTful interfaces. The StorNext AEL6 is an archive storage appliance specifically designed for media workflows. The starting list price for the AEL6 is $42,500.00.

StorageSwiss Take

These new additions to Quantum’s comprehensive storage portfolio provides organizations with advanced data management features that simplify and automate the tasks of data lifecycle management while also ensuring the integrity and durability of data on tape. Organizations that plan to deploy a private cloud or may already have one, should take a close look at the new Scalar platform from Quantum. It can provide them with a very cost effective means to meet unstructured data challenges.

About Joseph Ortiz

Joseph is a Lead Analyst with DSMCS, Inc. and an IT veteran with over 35 years of experience in the high tech industries. He has held senior technical positions with several major OEMs, VARs, and System Integrators, providing them with technical pre and post- sales support for a wide variety of data protection solutions. He also provided numerous technical analyst articles for Storage Switzerland as well as acting as their chief editor for all technical content up to the time Storage Switzerland closed upon their acquisition by StorONE. In the past, he also designed, implemented and supported backup, recovery and encryption solutions in addition to providing Disaster Recovery planning, testing and data loss risk assessments in distributed computing environments on UNIX and Windows platforms for various OEM's, VARs and System Integrators.