June 3, 2009

What is Storage Consolidation?
Storage Consolidation is generally defined as the act or ability to centralize the available storage resources of an organization into a physical or virtual pool of storage resources that can be effectively managed and provisioned to applications across the enterprise on an as-needed basis.

Companies thinking about Storage Consolidation solutions usually want to increase the utilization of their existing storage hardware and simplify storage management, which reduces total cost of ownership and increases return on investment.

Benefits of Storage Consolidation
Storage Consolidation allows users to move data from a server-based platform that is prone to hardware failures and has limited drive space to a high availability Storage Area Network (SAN).  An example of a SAN is the EMC CLARiiON AX4, which delivers performance, scalability, and advanced data management features in one, easy-to-use storage solution.

According to industry studies, the average utilization of database and applications server storage is between 35 to 50 percent. This means that at any given time, companies have about twice the amount of storage that is actually being utilized, which means their associated cost is at least twice what they bargained for in the first place. Evolution in storage technology and the availability of network-based storage has made it possible for companies of any size to effectively consolidate their database and application server storage and increase their utilization rates by an average of approximately 30 percent.

Moving data from a local server onto a SAN like the EMC CLARiiON AX4 frees up local server resources and allows you to reclaim limited drive space on a server, cut back on local disk reads/writes, prolong the life of disk drives, and increase your utilization rates by approximately 30 percent.

Click here to visit the EMC Web site and read author Raza Syed’s complete report, “Storage Consolidation – The Way to Efficient IT.”

To find out more about Storage Consolidation and how it can benefit your company, please contact Accudata Systems at 800-246-4908.

About Accudata Systems, Inc.
Accudata Systems is an IT consulting and integration firm with more than twenty-seven years of experience providing high impact IT services and integrated solutions. With focused competencies in Enterprise Platforms, Security, Infrastructure, Assessments & Compliance, Unified Communications, and Managed Services, Accudata Systems provides a full array of services ranging from technology assessments to project deployment and support. As trusted advisors to our clients, we assist them in creating and supporting a computing environment that maximizes their investment in information technology. Accudata Systems is headquartered in Houston, Texas and has offices in Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and Los Angeles. Get more information at www.accudatasystems.com.