Multimedia
Blogs
Forum
Affordable HD
Whitepapers
Newsletters
Events
Advertisers
DCP Directory
MillimeterProducts: Isilon
Apr 1, 2005 4:49 PM, By Dan Ochiva
Intelligent Storage
As demands on storage and networking continue to grow, standard storage topologies are starting to reach their limits. Vendors now promote new approaches to deliver speedy, highly scalable storage systems, including Exanet's distributed clustered NAS and Datadirect Networks' storage controllers.
Isilon Systems offers its own approach via its IQ clustered storage system, a distributed file system that creates a single, shared global namespace while using off-the-shelf hardware. Isilon describes its product as designed specifically for digital content, with Sony Pictures Imageworks and Technicolor among its clients.
The IQ simplifies adding additional storage via the use of all-in-one modular nodes that contain both storage and processing. Throughput actually increases with each added node. That's because Isilon's OneFS file system spreads each file among the nodes, so adding another node further spreads the file into smaller pieces. OneFS then reads and writes in parallel from and to each of the nodes.
The latest 3.0 version of OneFS adds FlexProtect-AP, a new data protection technology which is said to rebuild a failed 250GB disk in as little as one hour, faster than Fibre Channel systems. www.isilon.com
