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Thread ID: 75252 2006-12-22 01:21:00 Making the Case for Storage Virtualization SurferJoe46 (51) PC World Chat
Post ID Timestamp Content User
508659 2006-12-22 01:21:00 I am still in the quest to store 1600 gig of movies and MP3's....is this any thing I can use?

whitepapers.techrepublic.com.com
SurferJoe46 (51)
508660 2006-12-22 01:43:00 SJ, you have 1.6 tirabytes of movies and mp3:stare: SolMiester (139)
508661 2006-12-22 02:10:00 So can I have some?

PM me :p
george12 (7)
508662 2006-12-22 08:34:00 "Storage virtualization" is a stupid name for a reliatively simple concept. The idea is to divorce storage "volumes" from the physical devices and to simply view a whole series of storage media as a single block of available storage. It is basically a way for companies to charge you a fortune for what can easily be obtained by combining iSCSI and RAID, both of which are available for free on Linux.

I would set up two servers with 5 x 250GB drives each in a RAID-5 array (2TB total capacity), install a Linux distribution and use iSCSI + LVM to create a single large striped volume. This could then be served using Samba. With a gigabit ethernet link between them, this would give a reasonably inexpensive, extremely fast redundant storage device with 2TB of space. Even better, with the LVM as the final layer it becomes possible to add a third server if the need arises. This would require carefully tweaked power management settings to keep the bills down but would provide the needed storage.

As an alternative, you could use a tape drive and some big tapes. Tapes are pretty slow though and would be a hassle to use.
TGoddard (7263)
508663 2006-12-22 09:50:00 Duh, isn't this what iDisk does?

(iiDisk being Mac's way of extending your HD space onto the net? Recently learned this. Nifty idea.)
mark c (247)
508664 2006-12-22 16:58:00 "Storage virtualization" is a stupid name for a reliatively simple concept. The idea is to divorce storage "volumes" from the physical devices and to simply view a whole series of storage media as a single block of available storage. It is basically a way for companies to charge you a fortune for what can easily be obtained by combining iSCSI and RAID, both of which are available for free on Linux.

I would set up two servers with 5 x 250GB drives each in a RAID-5 array (2TB total capacity), install a Linux distribution and use iSCSI + LVM to create a single large striped volume. This could then be served using Samba. With a gigabit ethernet link between them, this would give a reasonably inexpensive, extremely fast redundant storage device with 2TB of space. Even better, with the LVM as the final layer it becomes possible to add a third server if the need arises. This would require carefully tweaked power management settings to keep the bills down but would provide the needed storage.

As an alternative, you could use a tape drive and some big tapes. Tapes are pretty slow though and would be a hassle to use.


I saved this for future reference...thanks!
SurferJoe46 (51)
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