Computer storage hardware

NVMe: PCIe card vs U.2 and M.2

We talk NVMe form factor choices – add-in card vs U.2. vs M.2 – and their uses, for primary storage or cache, with Server StorageIO founder and analyst Greg Schulz Continue Reading

Hybrid cloud 101: Using the cloud as a storage tier

We look at what’s possible when it comes to hybrid cloud, what types of data and what hybrid cloud architectures can combine on-premise and cloud storage capacity Continue Reading

HPE buys hyper-converged pioneer Simplivity for $650m

Hardware giant pays out for hyper-converged market number two, and says it will keep existing Simplivity products, moving them all to its ProLiant servers by the end of 2017 Continue Reading

Nutanix, Simplivity and Pivot3 lead hyper-converged pack: Forrester

Forrester rates 12 hyper-converged infrastructure providers according to products, company strategy and market presence, with Nutanix, Simplivity and Pivot3 coming out on top-line Continue Reading

Backup 101: Incremental vs differential vs synthetic full backup

Backup methods pros and cons: Full, incremental, differential, synthetic full, incremental forever, and reverse incremental. We set out the advantages and drawbacks of each Continue Reading

IBM refreshes all-flash DS8880 series with PCIe 3.0 enclosures

IBM adds an F to existing DS8884, DS8886 and DS8888 all-flash and hybrid arrays with addition of PCIe 3.0 disk connectivity, but stops short of NVMe capabilities Continue Reading

Top 10 virtualisation and storage stories of 2016

Flash storage has held onto the headlines in 2016, but hyper-converged infrastructure, containerisation, software-defined storage and VMware’s plans for the hybrid cloud are rising themes Continue Reading

NVMe over fabrics vs Fibre Channel, Ethernet, Infiniband

NVMe over fabrics takes the built-for-flash advantages of the PCIe-based protocol, and allows NVMe to be sent via Fibre Channel, Ethernet and Infiniband networks Continue Reading

Disaster recovery testing: technology systems to test DR

In this concluding part of a two-part series, Computer Weekly looks at ways of testing disaster recovery plans, with methods including array-based replication and hypervisor-based approaches Continue Reading

Tape backup: Often old and confused, but quite cheap

Survey results show those with tape are likely to have old tapes, multiple formats, including defunct ones, and no way of knowing what is on them. But tape is still quite cheap for most Continue Reading

Storage briefing: NVMe vs SATA and SAS

NVMe brings blistering performance gains over existing HDD-era disk protocols, and is a straight swap-in for PCIe server-side flash with array and hyper-converged products on the way Continue Reading

Disaster recovery testing: A vital part of the DR plan

Disaster recovery provision is worthless unless you test out your plans. In this two-part series, Computer Weekly looks at disaster recovery testing in virtualised datacentres Continue Reading

Machine learning keeps customers happy at Ocado

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we find out how data scientists at online grocer Ocado are using machine learning technology to deliver better customer service and improve warehouse efficiency. Manufacturing giant GE is making a play to become a top 10 software supplier – we look at the plans. And we examine the future of server operating systems as workloads move increasingly to the cloud. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

IT spreads innovation at Unilever

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we find out how consumer goods giant Unilever has changed its thinking about IT to support a global digital transformation programme. The UK boss of Hewlett Packard Enterprise assesses progress after the first year since HP split in two. And we examine how software development is changing in the enterprise. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Software-defined storage: The pros and cons, and what is available

Software-defined storage is a rapidly rising trend in the datacentre, but what are the advantages and disadvantages of building your own storage, and is it suitable for all organisations? Continue Reading

VMware VSAN 6.5 supports containers and physical servers via iSCSI

VMware Virtual SAN now supports containers with persistent storage and allows physical server storage access to its shared pool of capacity via the iSCSI SAN protocol Continue Reading

Quantum refreshes Scalar tape library family with i3, i6 and AEL6

Quantum’s StorNext universe boosted by new tape libraries – the i3, i6 and AEL6 – with increased data density on the back of denser storage and improved robotics Continue Reading

Is it NAS? Is it object storage? It’s both. It’s Avere’s C2N

Avere launches C2N hybrid NAS/object storage box that uses touted efficiencies of erasure coding to take aim at claimed drawbacks of clustered NAS rivals like Isilon Continue Reading

Docker storage: how to get persistent storage in Docker

Docker, by default, doesn’t come with persistent storage, which presents an issue to some workloads customers that want to run in containers – however, there are ways to achieve persistent storage Continue Reading

Hypergrid adds metered usage and networks to hyper-converged kit

Hyper-converged appliance maker will allow customers to pay for what they use in hardware that will now add networking Continue Reading

Computer Weekly 50th anniversary special

It’s been 50 years since Computer Weekly's launch on 22 September 1966. To mark this achievement, we have compiled a special edition of the magazine to reflect on how much the British technology industry has contributed over that time – and, of course, to celebrate our role in keeping IT professionals in touch with those developments – week-in, week-out, for half a century. Read this 100-page anniversary special now. Continue Reading

Italian bottle maker deploys 88TB of Syneto hyper-converged storage

Serioplast gets reliable disaster recovery as it replaces NetApp plus remote physical servers with Syneto hyper-converged infrastructure at factories across Europe, Africa and Asia Continue Reading

Blockchain and the promise of cooperative cloud storage

Blockchain technology allows distributed retention of encrypted data and is at the heart of cooperative cloud storage Continue Reading

Cloud firm Backbone relegates X-IO SAN with Atlantis tiered storage

London-based Backbone uses Atlantis USX as storage virtualisation layer on top of PCIe flash and X-IO and as a stepping stone to hyper-converged infrastructures Continue Reading

HPE boosts MSA and StoreVirtual with sub-$10,000 flash storage options

HPE launches new StoreVirtual 3200 entry-level array that can cost as little as $6,000, plus the SME-focused MSA 2042 array which has 800GB of flash embedded Continue Reading

Nimble adds to all-flash arrays with entry-level AF1000

Nimble made its debut in all-flash in February 2016, but now adds an entry-level array, the AF1000, plus upgrades to its hybrid flash array products that up performance and capacity Continue Reading

SAP Hana storage 101

If you're starting down the road towards SAP Hana in-memory analytics you'll need to understand its storage requirements. Here are some basics to get you started Continue Reading

Pure Storage drips out more of its all-flash analytics FlashBlade

Pure lets more customers use its flash-based analytics platform FlashBlade, before the product aimed at high-throughput unstructured data is made generally available later in 2016 Continue Reading

Nutanix adds storage for containers, physical servers and all-flash

Hyper-converged infrastructure maker Nutanix adds container support with persistent storage, offers block iSCSI storage for physical servers and allows all-flash across the product range Continue Reading

Shadow data and the risks posed by cloud storage and apps

Cloud storage and apps can open up an organisation to risks of data leakage. Computer Weekly looks at key areas of vulnerability and what you can do to prevent your data going viral Continue Reading

CW ANZ: June 2016

Read how scientists at a major Australian university are benefiting from the latest storage technology to help them get the most out of advanced IT already in place. More than 100 scientific teams share the sophisticated high-performance computer facilities at Monash University’s eResearch Centre in Melbourne, Australia. To help scientists get the best from the computing facilities, Monash built a state-of-the-art software-defined storage cluster using open source technologies and cost efficient hardware from Dell. Continue Reading

It makes sense to go hyperscale/hyper-converged

Hyperscale computing and storage are the norm for web giants. Hyper-converged scenarios make it possible for small and medium-sized enterprises to gain the advantages of combined server/storage nodes Continue Reading

PCIe SSD: Cache vs storage tier

Adding PCIe flash is a popular way of speeding up application response times, with more rapid I/O guaranteed, but should PCIe SSD be added as cache or as a tier of storage? Continue Reading

Amazon S3 storage 101: Object storage in the cloud

Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3) has emerged as a de facto standard for accessing data in the cloud. We run the rule over S3, its key attributes and what you need to know to use it with your applications Continue Reading

IBM all-flash family gets cloud and enterprise A9000 and A9000R

IBM announces two all-flash arrays – the modular A9000 and rack A9000R, aimed at service providers and enterprises – and the mainframe-connected DS8888 Continue Reading

HDS G series arrays get native NAS and cloud as a storage tier

VSP G series enterprise hybrid flash arrays see addition of native NAS functionality on a controller card plus cloud as a storage tier via Hitachi Content Platform Continue Reading

CW@50: Storage – From punched cards to flash and the cloud

Since the launch of Computer Weekly in 1966, we have moved from a world of punched cards and paper tape to one where flash and the cloud have revolutionised data storage Continue Reading

SimpliVity adds Hyper-V support to hyper-converged products

Hyper-converged appliance maker adds Hyper-V support to VMware ESXi capabilities and upgrades OmniStack software to support workload optimisation on SimpliVity clusters Continue Reading

OSNexus unlocks Ceph object storage in QuantaStor v4

Software-defined storage maker OSNexus adds Ceph-based object storage to its QuantaStor product, adding it to block and file storage from ZFS, Gluster and Ceph Continue Reading

Cloud storage appliances: What they are and who provides them

We look at the cloud storage appliance market – everything from local gateway presentation of the cloud, via hybrid cloud, to the new generation of cloud-resident appliances Continue Reading

Unaligned I/O: A storage performance killer

As the stack piles higher – with virtual servers, their virtual disks and guest operating systems – the scope for unaligned or misaligned I/O to affect performance increases Continue Reading

Top 10 storage stories of 2015

The year 2015 in storage was dominated by the continued rise of flash and Dell’s purchase of EMC, but there were steady upticks in trends such as hyper-converged and software-defined storage Continue Reading

Disaster recovery planning: Where virtualisation can help

The disaster recovery planning process is not fundamentally technology-centric, so when can virtualisation make it quicker and easier to restore services after an unplanned outage? Continue Reading

Top five things to know about flash and storage tiering

Automated storage tiering boosts storage efficiency and saves money, but why is tiering different from caching, why is it suited to use with flash and how do suppliers differ? Continue Reading

Snapshots: Hypervisor vs Array

Snapshots are a valuable part of the data protection toolkit, but where is it best to run them from – the hypervisor or the storage array? We look at the pros and cons Continue Reading

Object storage: Cloud vs in-house

Object storage is a rising star in data storage, especially for cloud and web use. But what are the pros and cons of cloud object storage or building in-house? Continue Reading

Hewlett Packard Enterprise: think of us as a startup

As Hewlett Packard Enterprise and HP Inc finally part ways, UK managing director Andy Isherwood shares some insight on what the future holds for the newly minted enterprise business Continue Reading

Commvault drops Simpana brand and adds features

Commvault will drop the Simpana name from the end of 2015 as it opens up to third-party data and attempts to bridge the gap between backup and replication Continue Reading

IT giants Dell and EMC unite

In this week's Computer Weekly, Dell's proposed $67bn acquisition of EMC would be the biggest in the history of IT – we assess the implications. £175bn of IT outsourcing contracts come up for renewal in the next three years- what are your options? And we hear from IT leaders about security and the internet of things. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Dell set to buy storage company EMC

Two years after his audacious bid to reinvent the company he founded by re-privatising it, Michael Dell has put in a bid for storage giant EMC Continue Reading

Virtualisation and disaster recovery: DR features in Hyper-V

We run the rule over the key functionality in Microsoft Hyper-V that can help with disaster recovery, including backup, migration, high availability and replication Continue Reading

Virtualisation and disaster recovery: DR features in VMware

The key areas of functionality in VMware that can help with disaster recovery – including VMware backup, migration, high availability and replication Continue Reading

Flash in NAS file access storage: Does it need it – and, if so, how much?

While flash is rapidly going mainstream for primary storage with the all-flash datacentre, does NAS file access storage need flash – and, if so, how much? Continue Reading

Cloudian boosts object storage HyperStore compliance features

Distributed object storage software maker Cloudian upgrades HyperStore with added granularity of data protection features that can help meet compliance requirements Continue Reading

SanDisk InfiniFlash flash arrays get Nexenta software-defined storage

SanDisk offers its all-flash array InfiniFlash IF100 with Nexenta's storage software on-board in another move in the trend towards choice in storage hardware and software deployments Continue Reading

OpenStack Swift 101: the object store for OpenStack apps

We run the rule over the OpenStack Swift object storage architecture, its key components, how it achieves resiliency and the data protection methods in use and development Continue Reading

All-flash vs hybrid flash for virtual desktop storage

With massive random I/O and a huge bias towards writes, virtual desktop storage – especially for the more feature-rich VDI 2.0 – requires the speed of all-flash and hybrid flash storage Continue Reading

TLC flash storage: What it is and what it's good for

We run the rule over triple-level cell (TLC) flash: What it is, how it performs, what it's good for, why it's a competitor to disk, and how it's all been made possible Continue Reading

Genomics England rejects open source to deploy EMC Isilon HPC storage

100,000 Genomes Project rejects building open-source parallel file system on x86 servers and opts for EMC Isilon clustered NAS deployed by Capita S3 Continue Reading

NetApp adds AFF All-Flash FAS 8000 series storage arrays

NetApp boosts its SSD array portfolio with the addition of AFF All-Flash FAS 8000 series storage arrays built on Data ONTAP, but still no sign of FlashRay general availability Continue Reading

Veritas plans to revive backup fortunes with big data analytics

Symantec spin-out Veritas plans major backup product releases that leverage metadata to make backups more efficient and unlock valuable information via big data capabilities Continue Reading

Council dodges £300,000 NetApp outlay with Atlantis flash caching

Somerset local authority avoids spending £300,000 on extra hard drives for its NetApp arrays and pays half that for Atlantis ILIO flash caching software that runs VDI from RAM Continue Reading

VMware vs OpenStack: How they handle storage

The opportunities and challenges presented by the two virtualisation environments when it comes to storage, backup and disaster recovery. Continue Reading

OpenStack Manila: File access storage for the open source cloud

OpenStack Manila is the file level access method in development by the open source cloud platform. What is it, how does it work and when will it be ready? Continue Reading

Pure Storage replaces FA series all-flash arrays with FlashArray//m

Pure Storage upgrades FA series all-flash arrays with FlashArray//m series devices Continue Reading

Computer Weekly European User Awards 2015 shortlist

Find out who made the Computer Weekly European User Awards 2015 shortlist Continue Reading

NetApp launches AltaVault hybrid cloud backup appliance family

NetApp repackages the SteelStore hybrid cloud backup appliances it bought from Riverbed as AltaVault physical, virtual and cloud products Continue Reading

EMC plots managed cloud push with $1.2bn deal to acquire Virtustream

Storage giant claims latest purchase will reinforce its hybrid cloud proposition for enterprises Continue Reading

Erasure coding vs Raid for disk rebuilds

Erasure coding as a means of data protection has emerged with object storage and offers an alternative to Raid systems Continue Reading

Veeam upgrades Availability Suite to support VMware VVOLs

Virtual machine backup specialist Veeam upgrades Availability Suite version 8 to support VMware Virtual Volumes Continue Reading

Load DynamiX adds OpenStack protocols to storage testing product

Storage testing and validation provider adds OpenStack Swift and Cinder support to existing protocols in its Enterprise version 2.6 hardware Continue Reading

Docker storage 101: How storage works in Docker

Docker nails some of the shortcomings of virtualisation, but what about Docker container storage? Continue Reading

Talon upgrades MobileFast for web and Windows file sync and share

Enterprise file sync and share provider Talon Storage adds web browser and Windows workstation access to MobileFast Continue Reading

IT priorities 2015: How will IT decision makers spend this year's budget?

The 2015 Computer Weekly/TechTarget IT priorities survey has examined the investment plans of IT managers in the UK and Europe in 2015 Continue Reading

VM backup down as a priority while disaster recovery still tops to-do lists

Our survey finds VM backup increasingly “job done”, while disaster recovery, cloud storage, flash storage and mobility remain high priorities; but where is mobile backup? Continue Reading

Top five things you need to know about VMware Virtual Volumes

VMware’s Virtual Volumes (VVOLs) promise a revolution in storage for virtual machines, but what are the key things you need to know? Continue Reading

$/GB vs $/IOPS and how to compare enterprise storage pricing

While raw drive prices are pennies per GB, the actual cost of enterprise storage is much higher. Finding a baseline can save you money Continue Reading

Dell adds Nutanix-powered XC630 and XC730 hyperconverged systems

Dell targets range of use cases with XC630 and XC730 Nutanix-powered server/storage nodes Continue Reading

PernixData FVP boosts RAM as host storage with up to 4x compression

Flash caching firm PernixData adds compression to FVP 2.5 for more scope to use RAM as host-based storage for high-performance datasets Continue Reading

IBM moves to MLC in FlashSystem 900 and V9000 all-flash arrays

IBM boosts density with new Micron MLC flash drives in revamped all-flash arrays, the FlashSystem 900 and the V9000 that includes SAN Volume Controller storage virtualisation hardware Continue Reading

Suse launches Ceph-based cloud software-defined storage

Suse launches commercially-supported object, block and file Ceph distribution Enterprise Storage, software-defined storage Continue Reading

How to combat VM sprawl

VMs are easy to create, but when unmanaged they proliferate around your infrastructure. Here, we explain VM sprawl and how to combat it Continue Reading

Cloud storage: The top five things that go wrong – and how to avoid them

Cloud storage provides cost savings and ease of management, but there are pitfalls – and here are the top five things that can go wrong Continue Reading

EMC launches VSPEX Blue EVO:Rail hyper-converged appliances

EMC announces VSPEX Blue EVO:Rail hyper-converged appliance in general purpose and performance variants Continue Reading

UK's fastest supercomputer upgrades to 2Pflops and 5PB of tiered storage

The UK's fastest supercomputer upgrades to 4,920 nodes and 2 Petaflops performance with tiered storage including 5PB of direct-attached disk Continue Reading

Amatis Networks waves goodbye to LUN woes and deploys Tintri hybrid flash

Managed service provider Amatis Networks deploys Tintri hybrid flash to slash latency and cut time-consuming LUN storage management overheads Continue Reading

Thin provisioning – hypervisor vs array

Thin provisioning can be done at the storage array or virtualisation hypervisor. We look at the pros and cons of each – or both Continue Reading

Top five issues in VM backup

Virtual machine backup is a vital task for IT departments. But pitfalls abound. We look at the top five issues encountered in VM backup Continue Reading

Hero Group uses vMotion to replace SAN and servers with Nutanix

Baby food, fruit and cereal bar company Hero Group has migrated its Holland operations over to a single virtual platform Continue Reading

HP is ‘coming back strong’, says CEO Meg Whitman

At the HP Discover event in Barcelona, CEO Meg Whitman addressed the future for customers following HP's split into two businesses Continue Reading

Flash storage 101: How solid state storage works

Why flash writes are troublesome, why endurance is limited and what suppliers are doing to overcome these issues Continue Reading

Key challenges in storage and virtualisation, and how to beat them

Server virtualisation brings benefits but increases storage-capacity needs. Here we survey the key challenges and what to do about them Continue Reading

Migrating away from Windows Server 2003

In this week’s Computer Weekly, as Microsoft prepares to end support for the popular Windows Server 2013 operating system, we assess the risk for organisations that fail to migrate in time. We hear from IT leaders delivering benefits from enterprise social media use to improve staff collaboration. And we look at criticisms from Oracle users about the supplier’s software licensing practices. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Interview: The IT powering animated movie-making

Video special effects require similar processing to oil and gas, but lack the budget, says head of technology at Illumination Mac Guff, Bruno Mahe Continue Reading

Airbus interview: research, innovation and the future of aviation

IT plays a substantial role in creating the aircraft of the future, with research and innovation at the core of the Airbus business strategy Continue Reading

The real story behind The Imitation Game film

The life of Alan Turing is being celebrated on the big screen this month. The Imitation Game from Studio Canal opens on November 14th 2014 and tells the story of the war hero who’s achievements until recently were largely unknown. Continue Reading

Government replaces Becta education IT procurement framework

Government seeks up to 20 suppliers to form a £300m procurement framework for ICT services to public-sector education organisations Continue Reading

BBC takes iPlayer video production to AWS cloud to beat bottleneck and storage woes

Having run Video Factory on AWS for over a year, BBC's Robert Shield explains how he overcame iPlayer bottleneck and availability challenges Continue Reading

EMC buys out Cisco’s stakes in VCE as year-on-year revenue jumps 9%

Storage giant EMC has reported a 9% increase year on year for the third quarter of 2014, thanks to revenue rises across its divisions Continue Reading

Why Shell, BP and PwC teamed up to launch platform-neutral IT4IT Forum

Lack of IT integration and workload interoperability is pushing enterprises such as Royal Dutch Shell to collaborate with IT providers to develop standards Continue Reading