STORAGE AREA NETWORKS (SANS)

STORAGE AREA NETWORKS (SANS)

ABSTRACT:

In the development of computer technologies, change comes very fast. Processor speeds have increased geometrically, and applications have become more powerful. The growth of e-commerce and dot com companies has occurred like a tsunami over the past 10 years, fundamentally changing the way people communicate and do business.

Servers do a good job of storing data, however, their capacity is limited, and they can become a bottleneck if too many users try to access the same information. Instead, most companies rely on peripheral storage devices such as tape libraries, RAID disks, and even optical storage systems. These storage devices are effective for backing up data online and storing large amounts of information.

But as server farms increase in size, and as companies rely more heavily on data-intensive applications such as multimedia, the traditional storage model isn’t quite as useful. This is because access to these peripheral devices can be slow, and it might not always be possible for every user to easily and transparently access each storage device.

As organizations face the prospect of storing and managing an increasing amount of information, they are rapidly turning to Storage Area Networks (SANs) as a cost-effective way to implement a highly strategic technology infrastructure. SANs are designed to provide a flexible environment that decouples servers from their storage devices through the use of Fibre Channel switch technology (commonly referred to as the SAN fabric).

SANs address today’s most challenging business requirements: how to protect and access critical data, how to utilize computing resources more efficiently, and how to ensure the highest levels of business continuance.


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