The previous chapter discussed the strategic nature of IT solutions, gave a brief economic history of the last five years, and demonstrated how issues such as poor utilization have plagued companies with large, direct-attached storage (DAS) installations.
This chapter presents the tangible and intangible benefits of storage networks, and evaluates each storage networking technology solution within the context of meeting today's demanding business requirements.
Additionally it discusses in detail the measurement of the total cost of ownership (TCO) for storage solutions (this is the most critical piece of financial analysis), and it demonstrates the basic steps required to build a TCO model for storage. Understanding the financial impact of storage networks is crucial to presenting the business case to management and it is a fundamental step in ensuring that your project meets its financial goals as planned.
This chapter covers the following topics:
Tangible and intangible benefits of storage networking
Technology solutions associated with storage networking
Increased availability
Backup and recovery options
Replication
SAN extensions
Total cost of ownership (TCO)