Are you having Storage issues? Are your hands full of unnecessary files? Is your Network Attached Storage nearing maximum capacity? NAS storage is here to help.
Storage optimization is about finding the best balance of speed, cost, redundancy, and size. Managing a NAS storage efficiently requires a good amount of knowledge about storage optimization and how to best leverage this for your business.
This article aims to highlight the best NAS system optimization tips to help you gain the most from your investment.
Make use of automatic storage tiering.
Automated storage tiering is an efficient technique for saving disk space. It automatically moves data from one storage location to another based on available space and the nature of data. For example, if your hard drive is half full, your software will automatically place any unsaved files into a separate storage space. This prevents accidental deletion of important data while also freeing up space on your hard drive for other files.
Re-think your NAS storage RAID configuration
Your enterprise NAS storage is more than just a hard drive in a bay. It’s a workhorse that stores all of your data and combines that data with other components to create a single, cohesive storage solution. Data is usually distributed throughout different drives in your enterprise NAS storage appliance through RAID. There are different RAID levels suited to different applications. By optimizing your RAID, you can maximize your storage capacity, reduce space used for backups/storage, and increase your organization’s overall efficiency.
Add an SSD to your NAS storage.
SSDs are fast and more reliable than standard hard drives. To avoid problems in the future, it is a good idea to add an SSD to your NAS storage. This will give you the best performance possible while also offering additional protection against data loss. SSDs can also be used in caching, which increases the performance even more. StoneFly NAS appliances come with SSD caching, and their StoneFusion OS is also installed on an NVME SSD, which significantly improves the performance of their NAS appliances. If you are interested, do check them out.
Cleaning up old files
Your NAS hard drive is filled with duplicate data, old files you no longer need, and files that are taking up valuable space. Cleaning up these old files allows you to free up space on your drives for new data and improve performance because the system won’t have to go through caching and indexing all those unneeded files.
Bottom Line
If you’ve ever had to manage a network attached storage device, you know how much of a challenge the task can be. So the next time you set out to optimize storage performance, make sure you follow these tips and enjoy an optimized NAS solution.
