The late comedian George Carlin used to do a routine that defined a home as “a place to put your stuff.” As it unfolded, the bit talked about the increasing accumulation of “stuff” and how eventually one needed to purchase a bigger home because one had “more stuff.”
The amount of data required by enterprises in order to operate could certainly fall into this humorous category. As computing has become more sophisticated, the volume of “stuff” needed to be kept and analyzed has grown dramatically, and so has the problem of efficiently storing and accessing it all. Storage Area Networks (SANs) solved the problem of isolated storage arrays and their accessibility from all applications; these arrays are networked together in such a way that the entire SAN is viewed as a series of “virtual disk drives,” each easily accessible from anywhere. In addition to access, benefits include simplified administration, scalability and flexibility.
There is one crucial factor that, if not properly and effectively addressed, can however bring SAN efficiency to a crawl, and that is file fragmentation. Since the SAN is “seen” by the OS and applications as logical drives, an I/O request processed by the file system has a number of attributes that must be checked, costing valuable system time. Fragmentation causes an application to issue multiple unnecessary I/O requests, keeping the processor busier than needed. Additionally, once an I/O request has been issued, the RAID hardware and software must process it and determine to which physical member the I/O request must be directed. With all the additional I/O requests, performance is greatly effected.
Today’s data centers are usually up 24X7, and are a terrific hotbed of activity without the added strain of fragmentation. SANs need to be maintained at maximum performance, period; fragmentation must be constantly addressed so that is simply eliminated. The “traditional” approach of scheduling defrag simply won’t work when there are few time windows in which to schedule maintenance—and in between such times fragmentation continues to build and hamper SAN performance.
The only true solution for SAN fragmentation is one that works fully automatically and invisibly, in the background. Because it utilizes only otherwise-idle resources, it requires no scheduling at all and has no negative impact on system processes. Fragmentation is no longer a problem, and SAN performance and reliability are fully maximized.
A SAN is one of the ultimate solutions for an enterprise to store and easily access their “stuff.” Make sure it is always quickly and reliably accessible by choosing the right fragmentation solution from the start.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
Scheduled Defragmentation: Is It Enough?
An argument is now occurring in the defragmentation world: does it take continuous work on a disk to keep it defragmented, or can it be effectively done periodically, scheduled in a specified time window? One might think the answer depends on which defragmentation solution provider you're talking to—but real-world challenges and disk activity can actually shed light on the truth of the matter.
In a laboratory environment, a disk with fragmented files can be defragmented during a specified time and be shown to have been effectively defragmented. But this laboratory environment has a few key differences between itself and the real world—not the least among them being the fact that in the real world, disk access and file fragmentation is constant. An ancient law of physics tells us that the only constant is change, and this is never more true than as regards the data residing on disk drives. What is occurring between these scheduled defrag runs? Is the disk remaining perpetually defragmented? Of course not. Fragmentation begins right away following the defragmentation run and continues to increase until the next scheduled run. And with today's technology and with constant access, that fragmentation—and its impact on performance—can be significant.
In contrast to the scheduled approach, a recent technical breakthrough allows fragmentation to actually be prevented—automatically, transparently, whenever idle system resources are available. This means that the solution is far more equipped to keep up with the ever-changing state of a disk drive—in short, it is changing as the fragmented state of the files are changing. Fragmentation is consistently addressed, and disk performance and reliability are kept at maximum.
Another aspect of the "scheduled" approach is that it is actually outmoded in today's computing environment. With much of today's business being globalized, access to many servers is 24X7. So when can defragmentation be scheduled in such a way that it won’t impact users? The answer: it can’t. Perhaps it can be scheduled when the least number of users are accessing a server—but users are obviously still being affected.
The new breakthrough requires no scheduling, as its operations do not impact system performance while it is running, hence does not affect users at all. This is an approach better geared to today’s demanding environment.
In addition, IT staff time is required to analyze an enterprises disk drives and schedule defragmentation. With today’s shortage of experienced IT personnel, scheduling defragmentation is hardly a worthy activity.
The scheduled approach to defragmentation may have worked once, when disk activity was far less hectic and there was significant downtime in which defragmentation could take place. But with today's constant access and file fragmentation, it can be easily shown to be an insufficient solution.
In a laboratory environment, a disk with fragmented files can be defragmented during a specified time and be shown to have been effectively defragmented. But this laboratory environment has a few key differences between itself and the real world—not the least among them being the fact that in the real world, disk access and file fragmentation is constant. An ancient law of physics tells us that the only constant is change, and this is never more true than as regards the data residing on disk drives. What is occurring between these scheduled defrag runs? Is the disk remaining perpetually defragmented? Of course not. Fragmentation begins right away following the defragmentation run and continues to increase until the next scheduled run. And with today's technology and with constant access, that fragmentation—and its impact on performance—can be significant.
In contrast to the scheduled approach, a recent technical breakthrough allows fragmentation to actually be prevented—automatically, transparently, whenever idle system resources are available. This means that the solution is far more equipped to keep up with the ever-changing state of a disk drive—in short, it is changing as the fragmented state of the files are changing. Fragmentation is consistently addressed, and disk performance and reliability are kept at maximum.
Another aspect of the "scheduled" approach is that it is actually outmoded in today's computing environment. With much of today's business being globalized, access to many servers is 24X7. So when can defragmentation be scheduled in such a way that it won’t impact users? The answer: it can’t. Perhaps it can be scheduled when the least number of users are accessing a server—but users are obviously still being affected.
The new breakthrough requires no scheduling, as its operations do not impact system performance while it is running, hence does not affect users at all. This is an approach better geared to today’s demanding environment.
In addition, IT staff time is required to analyze an enterprises disk drives and schedule defragmentation. With today’s shortage of experienced IT personnel, scheduling defragmentation is hardly a worthy activity.
The scheduled approach to defragmentation may have worked once, when disk activity was far less hectic and there was significant downtime in which defragmentation could take place. But with today's constant access and file fragmentation, it can be easily shown to be an insufficient solution.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
The Right Fragmentation Solution Means True ROI
Return-on-investment (ROI) is a very important term to businesses. For any dollar spent, they want it proven—and then demonstrated—that there will be more than a dollar returned for that expenditure. Especially in an economic climate like that of today, an investment with an even or a minus return is extremely unpopular. An example might be a piece of equipment costing tens of thousands of dollars that seems to be requiring a thousand dollars a month to maintain, another five thousand to man and operate and that appears to be adding little to nothing of value to the final product. Another (sometimes less obvious) example is the Vice President that generates reams of inter-office memos, ties up otherwise-productive employees in lengthy meetings and contributes less than nothing to the forward motion of the company's goals.
Another very common—but often unobserved—item with no or minus ROI is the traditional method of addressing fragmentation known as scheduled defragmentation. On the surface it may sound fine: defragmentation can be scheduled to occur during off hours so that computer files can be maintained in a fragmentation-free state and computer access and performance can be maximized. But when you start examining the actual ROI of scheduled defragmentation, the proposition starts to unravel.
First, when exactly can defragmentation be scheduled so it won't interfere with users or other production? Many of today's servers operate 24X7 and cannot be interrupted or taken down for defragmentation. Second, what vital tasks are not being completed while valuable IT hours are being invested in analyzing and scheduling defragmentation?
While both the above are important points and negatively affect ROI, it's the third point that's the real kicker: is the solution actually and fully defragmenting drives? If you apply a simple bit of scrutiny, you will find the answer to be a resounding "no!" In between the scheduled runs, fragmentation is continuing to build and impact performance, and in some cases the defragmenter isn't addressing fragmentation at all. The basic ROI of a fragmentation solution is the fact that it eliminates fragmentation and increases performance all across an enterprise; if it isn't doing that, there is no ROI and it belongs on the scrap heap with that useless machine or being ushered out the back door with that superfluous Vice President.
The only solution that truly addresses today's fragmentation is fully automatic. This solution operates invisibly, in the background, utilizing otherwise-idle resources so that fragmentation is consistently eliminated. No scheduling is ever required. With such a solution comes the real ROI expected: for a relatively small investment, computer performance and reliability are actually maximized along with employee productivity. There are few investments that can be made with that kind of solid, dependable return.
Return-on-investment (ROI) is a very important term to businesses. For any dollar spent, they want it proven—and then demonstrated—that there will be more than a dollar returned for that expenditure. Especially in an economic climate like that of today, an investment with an even or a minus return is extremely unpopular. An example might be a piece of equipment costing tens of thousands of dollars that seems to be requiring a thousand dollars a month to maintain, another five thousand to man and operate and that appears to be adding little to nothing of value to the final product. Another (sometimes less obvious) example is the Vice President that generates reams of inter-office memos, ties up otherwise-productive employees in lengthy meetings and contributes less than nothing to the forward motion of the company's goals.
Another very common—but often unobserved—item with no or minus ROI is the traditional method of addressing fragmentation known as scheduled defragmentation. On the surface it may sound fine: defragmentation can be scheduled to occur during off hours so that computer files can be maintained in a fragmentation-free state and computer access and performance can be maximized. But when you start examining the actual ROI of scheduled defragmentation, the proposition starts to unravel.
First, when exactly can defragmentation be scheduled so it won't interfere with users or other production? Many of today's servers operate 24X7 and cannot be interrupted or taken down for defragmentation. Second, what vital tasks are not being completed while valuable IT hours are being invested in analyzing and scheduling defragmentation?
While both the above are important points and negatively affect ROI, it's the third point that's the real kicker: is the solution actually and fully defragmenting drives? If you apply a simple bit of scrutiny, you will find the answer to be a resounding "no!" In between the scheduled runs, fragmentation is continuing to build and impact performance, and in some cases the defragmenter isn't addressing fragmentation at all. The basic ROI of a fragmentation solution is the fact that it eliminates fragmentation and increases performance all across an enterprise; if it isn't doing that, there is no ROI and it belongs on the scrap heap with that useless machine or being ushered out the back door with that superfluous Vice President.
The only solution that truly addresses today's fragmentation is fully automatic. This solution operates invisibly, in the background, utilizing otherwise-idle resources so that fragmentation is consistently eliminated. No scheduling is ever required. With such a solution comes the real ROI expected: for a relatively small investment, computer performance and reliability are actually maximized along with employee productivity. There are few investments that can be made with that kind of solid, dependable return.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
The Right Defrag Solution--More Cost Effective Than a Free Solution
A utility or function that is "free" should always be examined carefully. For example, an aspiring musician may go shopping for a keyboard and find one for a decent price that has a built-in "free" drum machine. On the surface, it sounds like a great deal; they can have rhythm accompaniment as they play and it's like having your own little band. But when they get the keyboard home and actually put this "free" drum machine to work, they find that it's very limited in the sounds it will produce and in fact makes their creations sound a bit cheesy. In order to make it sound halfway good, the drum sounds will have to be run through a separate amplifier. But then they find that they can't even run the drum machine out from the keyboard separately. After countless wasted hours and endless tweaking, the musician realizes that it would have taken far less money and time—and would have produced a better result—if he or she had just invested in a professional drum machine in the first place.
Moving over into the world of computers, one finds a similar scenario: that of a free defragmenter. Again on the surface it sounds ideal. There is no up-front cost, and it will take care of that performance-crippling fragmentation problem so IT can take their attention off of it and move onto other pressing matters.
But when the time comes to actually get the defragmentation work done, a realization will dawn upon the system administrator about how “free” this defrag solution isn’t. First it has to be scheduled, many times on systems that must remain up and running 24X7. Many IT hours can be wasted in trying to fit in such schedules. Users cannot be on the system when the free defrag is running, causing more lost time and worse, income. And in between these scheduled runs, fragmentation continues to build and impact performance and reliability, which lowers the cost-effectiveness of the entire enterprise.
Then even more problems arise. IT personnel can never tell if a disk is fully defragged because there is no progress chart in the UI. Only one instance of the defragger can be run at a time. Only local drives can be defragmented.
The only true defrag solution today is one that does not require scheduling and addresses fragmentation consistently in the background. Because only idle system resources are used, there is never a negative impact on users. Such a solution means that IT can remove their attention from fragmentation at the moment this solution is installed—performance and reliability are constantly maximized. When comparing such a solution to the free defragmenter, the actual and staggering costs of the "free" utility become readily apparent.
Moving over into the world of computers, one finds a similar scenario: that of a free defragmenter. Again on the surface it sounds ideal. There is no up-front cost, and it will take care of that performance-crippling fragmentation problem so IT can take their attention off of it and move onto other pressing matters.
But when the time comes to actually get the defragmentation work done, a realization will dawn upon the system administrator about how “free” this defrag solution isn’t. First it has to be scheduled, many times on systems that must remain up and running 24X7. Many IT hours can be wasted in trying to fit in such schedules. Users cannot be on the system when the free defrag is running, causing more lost time and worse, income. And in between these scheduled runs, fragmentation continues to build and impact performance and reliability, which lowers the cost-effectiveness of the entire enterprise.
Then even more problems arise. IT personnel can never tell if a disk is fully defragged because there is no progress chart in the UI. Only one instance of the defragger can be run at a time. Only local drives can be defragmented.
The only true defrag solution today is one that does not require scheduling and addresses fragmentation consistently in the background. Because only idle system resources are used, there is never a negative impact on users. Such a solution means that IT can remove their attention from fragmentation at the moment this solution is installed—performance and reliability are constantly maximized. When comparing such a solution to the free defragmenter, the actual and staggering costs of the "free" utility become readily apparent.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
When "Free" Actually Costs More
This might have happened to you: You’re off on a resort vacation that you’ve looked forward to for months, in some tropical paradise. You’re dreamily exploring the resort on the first day, and you come across a person who offers you a free champagne brunch, for you and your spouse. You think, great! A free high-end meal! When you get there, though, you realize how free it isn’t. The food is great—but you have to sit there for two hours listening to a sales pitch on condo timesharing. And for the rest of your vacation, some salesman is pursuing you all over the resort, popping up every time you turn around, trying to close you on buying into his "great plan." That "free brunch" was anything but—it put a serious damper in your dream vacation, which you paid substantial money to take.
In the world of computing, the same could be said for a free or inexpensive defrag utility. Yes, it costs little to nothing at the outset—but defragmentation is a serious performance problem, and soon you’re going to have to run that utility. The first problem you’re going to have is, it needs to be scheduled. Most corporate systems need to be up and running constantly, so finding a time window in which to schedule defragmentation is a major problem. And, the time that the system is offline is the first major cost of the free or inexpensive utility.
When you finally can schedule and run it, you find out that it runs, and runs, and runs, consuming system resources the whole while, and never seems to actually complete a defrag job. If you add up the number of hours that IT staff have spent trying to get useful work out of this utility, you’ll come across the second major cost of this utility.
There are third-party solutions to fragmentation that are far more efficient. In fact, technology has now evolved to the point that a majority of fragmentation can actually be prevented before it even occurs—completely automatically, and with no impact on system resources. The I/O resources required to defragment files after they have already been fragmented are saved, and peak performance is constantly maintained.
Now, compare the price of the of the free or "low-cost" utility to the third-party solution. There is an initial cost for the third-party solution—but once it is installed and running, fragmentation is basically a thing of the past. The net result: the bargain utility actually costs far more.
In the world of computing, the same could be said for a free or inexpensive defrag utility. Yes, it costs little to nothing at the outset—but defragmentation is a serious performance problem, and soon you’re going to have to run that utility. The first problem you’re going to have is, it needs to be scheduled. Most corporate systems need to be up and running constantly, so finding a time window in which to schedule defragmentation is a major problem. And, the time that the system is offline is the first major cost of the free or inexpensive utility.
When you finally can schedule and run it, you find out that it runs, and runs, and runs, consuming system resources the whole while, and never seems to actually complete a defrag job. If you add up the number of hours that IT staff have spent trying to get useful work out of this utility, you’ll come across the second major cost of this utility.
There are third-party solutions to fragmentation that are far more efficient. In fact, technology has now evolved to the point that a majority of fragmentation can actually be prevented before it even occurs—completely automatically, and with no impact on system resources. The I/O resources required to defragment files after they have already been fragmented are saved, and peak performance is constantly maintained.
Now, compare the price of the of the free or "low-cost" utility to the third-party solution. There is an initial cost for the third-party solution—but once it is installed and running, fragmentation is basically a thing of the past. The net result: the bargain utility actually costs far more.
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