Patent Pending

Mike Linett, president of Zerowait, a Newark, Del.-based storage integrator, put the problem simply: "Our customers ... have been asking us for years why they can't have the best of both worlds: the simplicity of network-attached storage [NAS] and the scalability of storage area networks [SAN.] They want to be able to use databases and access files on the same storage platform, rather than buying proprietary ? and usually expensive ? storage platforms to handle each type of data separately." The schism represented by NAS and SAN ? file-based storage vs. block-based storage ? has far-reaching consequences. On a practical level, it contributes to the management issues and high cost of operations that plague many IT shops today. Different storage platforms require different tools and skill sets to administer and manage. The good news is that the problem is close to being resolved. A new generation of NAS-SAN "hybrid platforms" is just around the corner. These platforms will take the best of both worlds to combine the ease of deployment and management associated with NAS and the scalability and performance of high-end block storage.While name-brand vendors, including IBM Corp. and Network Appliance Inc., have indicated they have such platforms in the works, some industry newcomers are planning to ship real products during the next few months. One is Linett's own Zerowait High Availability storage appliance. According to Linett, his engineers have been working to integrate a home-grown, storage-optimized, Linux operating system kernel with virtualization technology from a partner, FalconStor, to create a custom-built NAS-SAN platform. The platforms will be capable of using a customer's existing storage devices and will be accessible via both direct Fibre Channel connection for block-based storage, and via the network file system or common Internet file system for file-based storage. Linett said he expects to sell about 50 customized platforms over the next year, with each unit tailor-made to fit the customer's infrastructure and requirements.Bill Chambers, chief executive officer of Left Hand Networks, Boulder, Colo., also shares the NAS-SAN vision. He calls his emerging products "a new category" of storage platform, coining the term "network unified storage," or NUS.Left Hand Networks' NUS 100 consists of a scalable storage repository with its own file system, the network shared file system. This system enables NUS storage to be shared with any server regardless of its native file system, and allows for the creation of virtual volumes that can be grown to any size to meet the storage capacity requirements of the most demanding customer.Left Hand also supports block-level access with a proprietary advanced Ethernet block storage protocol. So a single platform can handle both block and file storage simultaneously.While early versions of the Zerowait High Availability and NUS products have been presented to the market over the past two months, less well-known is the forthcoming solution from Pittsburgh-based Spinnaker Networks. Product Manager Mark Buczynski said Spinnaker will release its "revolutionary" NAS-SAN hybrid within the year.Bottom line: Storage technology consumers should watch for a new generation of NAS-SAN hybrid platforms over the next six to 12 months. Assuming that early movers deliver what they are promising, these platforms will likely eclipse the value proposition of early SANs as well as the current generation of NAS appliances by providing a scalable, manageable and unified storage solution with both block and file support.