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BeyondRAIDTM Technology
Taking you beyond RAID!
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BeyondRAID™ leverages the benefits of traditional RAID systems, while leaving many of the limitations behind. This next-generation of redundant storage technology brings together safety, reliability, expandability, efficiency and ease-of-use.
BeyondRAID fits in the same place of the software stack as traditional RAID between the file system and the driver. Hence, BeyondRAID can be adopted without any change in infrastructure, allowing you to maintain your current file system and operating system, while eliminating the friction costs typically associated with moving to a new technology platform.
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Problems with Traditional RAID
IT managers are faced with the complicated question of which one of the eleven traditional RAID levels they should deploy for their business storage.
There are two major disadvantages with traditional RAID:
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Lock-in of RAID levels for the lifecycle of the data and
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A forced tradeoff between simplicity vs. safety and stability vs. expandability
As business conditions change over time, IT managers are obliged to choose between purchasing a new RAID array and the cost and effort of redeploying a more appropriate RAID level.
BeyondRAID is RAID without Regrets
Data Robotics BeyondRAID solves these two critical issues, delivering flexibility without downtime. Built on an advanced storage virtualization platform, BeyondRAID chooses the correct RAID algorithm based on data protection needs at any given moment. Since the technology works at the block level, it can write blocks of data that alternate between data protection methodologies.
If an IT manager needs to add storage capacity to a Drobo product, he or she can simply insert additional disk drives or replace the smallest disks—no need to change RAID levels, purchase a new storage array or go through the complex administration of pooling RAID groups.
The BeyondRAID feature even allows IT managers to switch from single to dual disk redundancy with a single click, thereby ensuring enterprise-level dual parity data protection if required.
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Head-to-head with Traditional RAID
Feature by feature, BeyondRAID consistently beats traditional RAID. If you already understand how RAID 0, 1, 5 or 6 operates, you’ll understand the fundamentals of BeyondRAID as it relies on the same underlying data protection methodologies, namely mirroring and striping with single or dual parity. The difference is in how BeyondRAID interacts with the storage itself. Check out the below chart and see the difference!
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RAID Features |
RAID 1 |
RAID 5 |
RAID 6 |
BeyondRAID |
| Single Disk Redundancy |
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X |
X |
X |
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Dual Disk Redundancy |
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X |
X |
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Three or More Disks in Array1 |
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X |
X |
X |
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Instant Expansion |
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X |
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Smart Volumes2 |
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X |
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Automatic Healing |
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X |
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Data Aware |
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X |
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Mixed Drive Size Utilization |
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X |
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Proportional Rebuild Times |
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X |
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Drive Re-Ordering |
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X |
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Virtualization Engine |
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X |
| Self-Managing |
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X |
¹ Available with Drobo S, DroboPro, DroboElite
² Available with DroboPro and DroboElite
For more info or pricing, contact CPU at 800-880-4200 or sales@cpu-distrib.com!
APC
