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TechFire1: 29 May 2012
The Burning Question: Can your storage bear the weight of a cloud? Virtualisation technology that can manage mixed environments of storage types and manufacturers, automate tiering and provide unified management on a ‘single pane of glass’ are now not only available to the Irish market, but accessible and easy to use. This was one of a series of key messages for attendees at the inaugural TechFire event in Dublin on 29 May. Richard Nunan, operations director, DNM Technology, emphasised the benefits of intelligent data management and how that was made possible through centralised management of the pooled storage infrastructure. With policy based self-service “empowering users, while enforcing governance”, Nunan said that technologies such as VMware’s vCloud can deliver process automation that accelerates service delivery and reduces operational cost. Mark Shaw, enterprise technologist, Dell, introduced the philosophy of fluid data, or the “right data in the right place at the right time—for the right cost”. This approach is built on an architecture that is highly automated and orchestrated, from the storage area network (SAN) right up to the application layer, with key elements such as dynamic tiering, tight hardware and software integration, innovative licensing for the virtual storage environment and scale out designs. Shaw said that all of this is possible, while maintaining the enterprise standard of 99.999% availability with up to 80% savings possible over traditional, non-virtualised storage infrastructures. In an interview with TechFire moderator and ComputerScope editor Paul Hearns, Martin Murphy, CTO, Galway University Hospitals, revealed how a reduction of hazardous materials directive left the hospital with a storage infrastructure that was not only unsupported but for which expansion parts would no longer be available. Murphy said that it was an opportunity to look at a pooled and virtualised storage infrastructure that would better support the needs of the clinicians. He said that the cardiology department in particular had seen its scan files increase by several orders of magnitude in recent times, putting pressure on storage. Murphy said that with the new storage infrastructure in place, there was not only a dramatic decrease in the cost of management but also a decrease in the reliance on specialised skills. He said that the IT department were able to adopt a “yes we can” attitude to supporting the requests from hospital departments due to the performance, reliability and flexibility of the new storage systems. Learn more about Dell technology for cloud storage. |
Richard Nunan
Mark Shaw
Martin Murphy
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