Data Storage - Managing Massive Amounts of Data

Perhaps it is karma, but the more successful you become, the more data you will have to deal with. Effectively managing massive amounts of data often comes down to the issue of data storage.

Data Overload

Mass data means large volumes of data or bulk data. Both in a standalone PC as well as in a network environment, we generally face the problem of managing data. The data grows day-by-day thereby creating problems of data handling. No doubt there are various techniques and devices that are capable of storing large amount of data like hard drives, optical disks, tapes etc. Hard drives are now available in almost all new computers. Data on a hard drive is stored on it through magnetic material. CD-ROM stores data on compact disks and it can store data up to about 600MB. Another relatively new device in competition to CD-ROM is DVD (Digital Versatile Disk) that has a capacity of 4.7 GB to 17GB and rate of data access from 600 Kbps to 1.3 Mbps. All of these devices manage and store in different ways. If you are working in network environment then these techniques are not going to help you as much as others.

Most businesses need to store data in order to make it accessible whenever required. NAS (network attached storage) is a fairly new mechanism of managing data, which use special devices that are connected directly to network equipments. These devices are accessible to clients through a server; each client has its own IP address. NAS is centralized storage technology. If you want to store more data or want to expand the storage then just add another device. Another technology that is quite popular nowadays is SAN (Storage Area Network), which is a network of storage devices. These storage devices are connected to each other and to a server with the help of some special switches. SAN takes the backup of data from your network without affecting the standard network infrastructure.

For connecting SAN storage devices, you can use fiber channel, a latest and most significant technology that interconnects storage devices and allows them to communicate at very high speeds and at greater distances than previously possible. It can cover up to 6 miles.

Two techniques that are quite popular these days for data storage are RAID and SCSI. Both are high speed and reliable techniques in data storage. These techniques can be implemented in most storage mechanisms like DAS, NAS and SAN. RAID is a series of standards that improves performance and fault tolerance by using a redundant array of inexpensive disks (hence the acronym). This type of protection is required in all data storages.

Three major factors that need consideration in any data management technique or data storage device are capacity, speed and security. Capacity means amount of data that can be stored. Speed means rate at which data can be retrieved. Some common interfaces for data storage are fiber channel, IEEE 1394, IDE, SCSI controllers and USB.

Some advanced techniques for managing data on your computer are DFS (Distributed File System) and EFS (Encrypting File System). DFS helps in locating and managing data on network. DFS bonds files on different computers and make them appear as single "namespace". EFS are used to store encrypted files on NTFS volumes. EFS prevent unauthorized user access.

According to your needs you can choose any of the techniques for data management and data storage.