Combined storage and real-time compression solution from IBM. Visit http://ibm.co/QExPjp to know more.

1. IBM Systems and Technology
Solution Brief
Combined storage and
real-time compression
solution from IBM
Maximize primary storage performance, utilization
and efficiency while reducing TCO
Data storage capacity requirements in almost every industry are rising
Highlights dramatically, compelling IT and systems managers to reassess their
options for cost-effective and efficient storage solutions. Generic primary
●● ● ●
Benefit from a single solution for both file storage systems are typically underutilized because they provide
storage and real-time compression
average or low performance, are complex to manage, and can have very
●● ● ●
Get high levels of performance, reliability expensive total cost of ownership. These few factors lead to the conclu-
and availability for your business-critical sion that file storage owners are receiving poor return on their investment
application environments
in storage systems. There are two key inhibitors to storing primary
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Optimize NAS file production data using file data efficiently: storing each file in the smallest space possible and
real-time compression—store up to five
maximizing the truly usable space of the storage subsystem.
times more capacity in the same space
●● ● ●
Lower TCO throughout the data lifecycle Combining the IBM® XIV® Storage System’s high-end storage array
with real-time data compression
performance and reliability, IBM System Storage® N series Gateway’s
●● ● ●
Gain easier provisioning and the flexibility high-availability and the data optimization achieved with the IBM Real-
to optimize virtual environments and cloud time Compression Appliance™ provides users with significant cost sav-
services
ings while delivering better application performance and availability. This
solution helps minimize capital expenditures on storage hardware while
reducing operating expenditures by lowering power, cooling, rack space
and systems administration requirements.

2. IBM Systems and Technology
Solution Brief
Efficient file storage solution for
primary data
Solution Architecture
When IBM designed this integrated primary file storage
Clients or Application Servers Storage Infrastructure
solution, we had a few goals in mind. The system should:
IBM Real-time
Compression
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Provide unparalleled performance and reliability.
●● ●
Deliver the highest levels of data protection and availability.
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Lower capital and operating expenditures compared to other
solutions. IP Network
In order to deliver a solution that achieves these challenging
goals, components with unique, leading-edge architectures
were required. For this, IBM chose to take the best-of-breed
approach and designed this solution using three of its award-
winning and successful products: XIV Storage, N Series
Gateway, and the Real-time Compression Appliance. Each
product in this solution has a unique role that leverages its core
architecture to address challenges triggered by the goals set.
●● ●
Data optimization appliance—the Real-time Compression
Appliance can shrink primary, online data by up to five times1
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Back-end storage—the XIV Storage System architecture in real-time, without impacting application performance. By
provides the predictable and consistently high performance significantly reducing storage requirements, it can increase
back end that enterprise-class applications require. The the effective capacity of the storage infrastructure to help you
XIV architecture eliminates the need for frequent and time- meet the demands of rapid data growth and enhance storage
consuming performance tuning by providing consistent performance and utilization.
Tier-1 performance across applications.
●● ●
NAS file gateway—System Storage N series Gateways pro- By looking into a more detailed view of the characteristic of a
vide network-attached storage (NAS) with a comprehensive single solution for both storage and real-time compression, you
suite of advanced data management capabilities designed can better understand the nature of the building blocks of this
to help in consolidating, protecting and recovering mission- solution and how together they can achieve the demanding
critical data for enterprise applications and users. goals set by IBM’s customers.
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3. IBM Systems and Technology
Solution Brief
High performance, reliable back-end ●● ●
Automatic optimization and management. Unlike traditional
storage—IBM XIV storage solutions, XIV automatically optimizes data distribu-
High performance is a critical requirement for enterprise-class tion through hardware configuration changes such as compo-
storage systems. However, maintaining high performance nent additions, replacements or failure. This helps eliminate
consistently for all applications over time has become especially the need for manual tuning or optimization.
challenging in recent years. This is because traditional storage
system architectures have often proven unsuccessful in meeting Choosing the XIV system’s product architecture to provide
the challenge of scaling performance in line with the unprece- the back-end storage for this solution provides a solid, high-
dented growth rates of storage data. performance, and reliable foundation for the entire solution.
Having such high levels of performance and efficiency available
The XIV Storage System is a groundbreaking, high perfor- in the back end enables sustaining end-to-end performance
mance storage product designed to help enterprises overcome and efficiency.
this challenge through an exceptional mix of game-changing
characteristics and capabilities: Combining the advantages of IBM XIV
●● ●
Breakthrough architecture and design. The revolutionary design
storage, IBM N series Gateway and
of XIV storage enables exceptional performance optimization IBM Real-time Compression Appliance
typically unattainable by traditional architectures for the same can reduce data management, power,
or higher price.
●● ●
Consistent, predictable performance and scalability. The XIV cooling and space demands while
system’s ability to optimize load distribution across all disks improving storage efficiency.
for all workloads, coupled with a powerful distributed cache
implementation, facilitates high performance that scales
Enterprise-class network attached
linearly with added storage enclosures. Because this high
storage—IBM N series Gateway
performance is consistent—without the need for manual
The N series Gateway product line is a network-based file
tuning—users can enjoy the same high performance during
storage system designed to provide IP and FCP access to
the typical peaks and troughs associated with data usage
SAN-attached heterogeneous storage arrays. The System
patterns, even after a component failure.
Storage N6000 and System Storage N7000 series systems
●● ●
Resilience and self-healing. XIV maintains resilience during
ordered with the Gateway feature help make the most of the
hardware failures, continuing to function with minimal
dynamic provisioning capabilities of Data ONTAP software
performance impact. Additionally, the solution’s advanced
while using high-performance, reliable back-end XIV storage.
self-healing capabilities allow it to withstand additional
hardware failures once it recovers from the initial failure.
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4. IBM Systems and Technology
Solution Brief
N series Gateways are designed to deliver the performance and Primary, active data optimization—
capacity needed to meet file access requirements for enterprises IBM Real-time Compression Appliance
of all sizes. They deliver outstanding performance, offer pet- The Real-time Compression Appliance is the only storage opti-
abytes of managed capacity and can be configured for simulta- mization solution that can shrink primary online data in real
neous active/active access with secure failover across two time, without impacting application performance. By signifi-
independent systems in a cluster. cantly reducing storage requirements, organizations can keep
up to five times more information online, use the improved
You can take advantage of the N series Gateway capabilities to efficiency to reduce storage costs or achieve a combination of
improve business efficiency and reduce file data management greater capacity and reduced cost. By transparently compressing
complexity using the following capabilities and characteristics primary data by up to 80 percent, the Real-time Compression
of N series Gateways. Appliance helps control the growth of storage, reducing the
amount of storage to be managed, powered and cooled.
●● ●
High availability: Takes advantage of proven features including
a high-performing and scalable operating system, data
management software and redundancy features Compression savings in primary NAS
●● ●
Simplified replication, backup and recovery: Supports disk-based data results in additional efficiencies
backup, with file or application-level recovery with
throughout the data lifecycle since smaller
SnapMirror, Snapshot and SnapRestore software features
●● ●
Management simplicity: Includes self-diagnosing systems data sets have to be backed up, replicated
designed to enable on-the-fly provisioning and protected
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Comprehensive software suite: Offers robust system manage-
ment, copy services, virtualization technologies, and disaster The Real-time Compression Appliance increases the effective
recovery and backup capabilities across storage resources capacity of the existing storage infrastructure, helping enter-
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Versatility: Provides a single, integrated architecture designed prises meet the demands of rapid data growth while maintain-
to support multi-protocol data access ing or enhancing storage performance. All IBM Real-time
Compression Appliance systems use our patented real-time
Adding N series Gateway to the XIV back-end storage used data compression techniques for primary storage, delivering
in this solution preserves the inherent characteristics of both optimization and savings throughout the entire data lifecycle.
products and their architectures across the solution stack. This The results can be rapid ROI, reduced operating expenses and
provides the availability, data-protection and performance bene- lower environmental impact.
fits of both systems, delivering a greater all-around experience
for your storage environment.
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5. IBM Systems and Technology
Solution Brief
●● ●
Enterprise ready: The Real-time Compression Appliance leverages the core value of each to achieve a combined best-in-
design offloads compression processing from both applica- class capability. XIV storage performance and reliability lay the
tion servers and storage systems, helping to improve foundation to meet enterprise-class requirements, providing
efficiency and performance at the same time. high levels of availability, reliability, performance and scalability
●● ●
Complete transparency: The Real-time Compression Appliance at very low overall cost. N series Gateways provide the capabil-
installs between N series systems using UNIX (NFS) and ity to manage petabytes of storage coupled with management
Microsoft Windows (CIFS) protocols and the network simplicity to provide versatile file support for all enterprise
switches, for completely transparent operations. Also, no applications environments. With its comprehensive software
application or IT process changes are necessary. suite, you get leading edge data-protection and storage manage-
●● ●
Downstream operational efficiency: Because the Real-time ment capabilities that support mission-critical availability,
Compression Appliance compresses primary storage, it enterprise level backup and disaster recovery, and a wide
reduces all IT processes and data such as NDMP backup/ range of compliance and regulation tools.
restore, replication bandwidth, snapshots and deduplication.
●● ●
High availability: The Real-time Compression Appliance The combination of XIV, N series and the Real-time
includes redundant and hot-swap components and is typically Compression Appliance provide a superior solution. First, it
deployed in pairs for nondisruptive failover. It seamlessly enables customers to lower capital and operating expenditures
deploys into existing high-availability configurations of the dramatically. In addition to helping lower your effective price
storage and network. per terabyte, the Real-time Compression Appliance increases
efficiency on the N series and the XIV by reducing the amount
One of the most valuable benefits provided by the Real-time of data they have to store, access, cache and manage by up to
Compression Appliance is the downstream efficiency. The five times. These efficiencies flow downstream across the data
capacity and data size savings you achieve in primary storage lifecycle and create an even greater impact on data-protection
cascade throughout the data lifecycle, so each copy or backup/ environments. Because the Real-time Compression Appliance
restore operation can benefit from the reduced size of data. is completely transparent to the environment and complements
This means you can keep more data online, keep more snap- other data reduction technologies, your current and future
shots and copies of your data, speed backups and restores (with storage investments are protected.
better RPO and RTO) and reduce bandwidth for site-to-site
replication of data. For more information
To learn more about the combined storage and real-time com-
Conclusion pression solution from IBM, please contact your IBM represen-
The solution described in this document presents a new tative or IBM Business Partner, or visit the following website:
approach to storing file data in primary storage environments. ibm.com/systems/storage
All components of this solution have a unique role that
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6. Additionally, IBM Global Financing can help you acquire the
IT solutions that your business needs in the most cost-effective
and strategic way possible. We’ll partner with credit-qualified
clients to customize an IT financing solution to suit your busi-
ness goals, enable effective cash management, and improve your
total cost of ownership. IBM Global Financing is your smartest © Copyright IBM Corporation 2012
choice to fund critical IT investments and propel your business IBM Corporation
forward. For more information, visit: ibm.com/financing IBM Systems and Technology Group
Route 100
Somers, NY 10589 U.S.A.
Produced in the United States of America
March 2012
IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, XIV, System Storage, and Real-time
Compression Appliance are trademarks of International Business Machines
Corp., registered in many jurisdictions worldwide. Other product and
service names might be trademarks of IBM or other companies. A current
list of IBM trademarks is available on the web at “Copyright and trademark
information” at ibm.com/legal/copytrade.shtml
Microsoft and Windows are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the
United States, other countries, or both.
UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the United States
and other countries.
This document is current as of the initial date of publication and may
be changed by IBM at any time. Not all offerings are available in every
country in which IBM operates.
The performance data discussed herein is presented as derived under
specific operating conditions. Actual results may vary. It is the user’s
responsibility to evaluate and verify the operation of any other products
or programs with IBM products and programs. THE INFORMATION
IN THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED “AS IS” WITHOUT ANY
WARRANTY, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WITHOUT
ANY WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A
PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND ANY WARRANTY OR CONDITION
OF NON-INFRINGEMENT. IBM products are warranted according to
the terms and conditions of the agreements under which they are provided.
1 Compression data collected from installed systems. Compression rates vary
by file type and content.
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