Why is the broadcasting industry moving to SANs?
As the broadcasting industry increasingly moves to digital technology their networks are grinding to a halt under the pressure of bandwidth-intensive applications, such as media streaming.
Companies are crying out for more efficient storage systems or they face huge productivity and revenue losses. It has been claimed that Storage Area Networks (SANs) are the fastest way to share and manage data, providing massive amounts of bandwidth and storage capacity. Major players such as BSkyB have already deployed the technology and are talking about huge financial savings and productivity gains. So what exactly is a SAN and why is it important? Why are so many industry professionals starting to take note of the huge potential of SANs?
Growing storage requirements in the broadcasting sector
IT systems are struggling to cope with the growth of data and memory-hungry applications, such as media streaming and particularly for those involved with the broadcasting of 1.5-Gbps high-definition video (HDTV). Traditional server to storage solutions are becoming overwhelmed, because server capacity is limited, which means that when many users attempt to access the same information at the same time, the server becomes a bottleneck.
This is particularly problematic for post-production professionals, such as video editors, who need to access and work on the same video project files simultaneously. Work has to be duplicated across the hard drives attached to each editor's workstation, which is often more time consuming than the actual project. In order to cope, many post-production companies are forced to add multiple or even hundreds of peripheral storage devices such as storage disk drives, although this approach cannot guarantee fast and unrestricted access to information in today's data intensive post-production environments.
Users have been searching for other ways to add storage to the network, for example, by using an interface known as SCSI (small computer systems interface) to connect storage devices to servers. They have also been looking at NAS (networked attached storage), where storage devices are connected via a LAN (Local Area Network -- the network linking workstations and servers) interface like Ethernet. However, SCSI-based storage and NAS-based configurations are suited to handling low volumes of data - which makes them less than ideal for the bandwidth-hungry applications, such as media streaming and large video files used by post-production professionals.
What the industry is demanding is a solution that enables them to manage huge amounts of data on a daily basis, provide multiple access to data, saves time, increases productivity and provides a substantial return on investment.
What is a SAN?
A SAN is a separate back-end network that sits behind the server and is dedicated to storage traffic and devices. These devices include multiple servers, disk drives/RAID arrays and tape libraries which are networked or linked together via a technology called Fibre Channel -- a very high-speed serial data transfer architecture.
Benefits of SAN
Fibre Channel based SANs centralise storage and allow instant access to all centrally held files. Users can work with the same data from any workstation simultaneously. Sharing storage through a dedicated network based on Fibre Channel technology can reduce expenditure and improve productivity. In addition, if a server is slow or goes down, access to the storage device is available by using another server on the SAN, providing a true redundant network topology, which is not found in traditional storage architectures. For example, BSkyB has installed a SAN to allow any users to work from any workstation, anytime and have direct access to the data they need, saving time and reducing costs. BSkyB's applications run much faster and it has experienced a ten-fold increase in productivity over its previous Ethernet set-up.
Using the LAN to back up data can absorb up to 30% of vital network space, according to IDC, which could be utilised by other day-to-day operations for greater levels of efficiency. By carrying traffic over the Fibre Channel SAN instead, provides a faster, more efficient way of backing up data and removes the burden from the LAN.
Editors can spend many week or even months on a single project, each day costing considerable amounts of money. If the data is destroyed in the event of a fire or flood, the consequences could be devastating. Data protection is fundamental and, unfortunately, many companies only focus on data protection when it is too late. With Fibre Channel technology, files can be quickly archived to tape and can be stored safely up to 10 kilometres away from servers - useful in the event of a building disaster.
The flexibility of storage solution is important as requirements continue to grow. The SAN will grow larger and more sophisticated allowing more functions and increased cost savings benefits. Not only do SANs save money, but the technology is also about to get much faster, upgrading from 1 to 2 Gigabits per second (200Mbps). 2 Gbps Fibre Channel promises a massive boost in raw data throughput, which will be indispensable to broadcasting professionals, particularly HDTV users.
Conclusion
From both a financial and operational perspective, the SAN stands out as a sought-after solution to many of the storage problems facing the broadcasting industry and media streaming professionals. Post-production environments with rapid storage growth, high availability or demanding performance requirements will all benefit from a SAN. With the increasing transition to digital technology, the hardware-sharing benefits of SANs, along with manageability, scaleability and performance advantages, are likely to position the technology as an increasingly popular choice and a worthwhile investment.
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