Dell PowerVault DL2000 - Manual (Page 5)

Intelligent Data Management
December 08 Page 5
Information must be protected both in primary storage and in cost-effective long-term storage,
available via search/discovery mechanisms that allow the organization to utilize its digital assets
and recover information quickly.
Cost effectiveness is vital and more than a matter of purchase price. It includes the cost of
management over the long haul. Complex solutions require more administrator hours and can
add dramatically to TCO. Also figuring in TCO is how effectively the organization is using its
server and storage resources. Optimization is a hallmark of IDM.
The most important hallmark of IDM is reduction in complexity. All the resources to achieve data
management exist in the market today — but as disparate products. Customers end up using
consulting services to stitch these components together into solutions, resulting in multiple
management interfaces and a lot of manual work on an ongoing basis to manage the data.
Components of IDM
• Plan /Analyze: This process could be as simple as understanding current workloads or as
complicated as trying to predict what the needs will be at some time in the future. Enterprises
usually accomplish such tasks through manual tracking and predictive analysis. Others utilize
storage resource management software. Solutions may also employ storage assessment
consulting or managed services that can leverage outside expertise for planning and
analyzing customer environments.
• Protect: Today, data protection is achieved by storing multiple copies of data to traditional
disk- or tape-based solutions using backup software. Other devices that have become popular
are the Virtual Tape Libraries (VTLs), disk-based devices that emulate tape solutions.
• Archive: Archive is often equated with long-term retention of backup data using lower-cost,
tape-based solutions. However, traditional tape-based backups lack the value of a truly
effective archive solution. An effective archive solution removes inactive or infrequently
accessed content from expensive primary storage and onto lower-cost media, while
maintaining right-time access to and governance of that content throughout its lifecycle.
• eDiscovery/Compliance: Effective archive solutions offer robust data classification and
policy-based rules engines for efficient, fully compliant content retention, search, and
discoverability. This feature is especially important for complying with industry, government,