Is There a Flash Memory RAID in Your Future?
Hard disk advocates have long looked down their noses at flash storage. But enterprise storage pros may be thinking differently about solid state, even (gasp!) for RAID. Flash memory is catching the notice of IT storage pros, whether from dealing with the increased use of USB thumb drives by the mobile work force or pondering the speedups promised for Windows Vista. However, recently the flash talk has taken a twist: RAID.
At the recent meeting of the San Francisco SNUG (storage networking user group), the combination of flash and RAID cropped up. The presenter, Diamond Lauffin, senior vice president at Nexsan Technologies, described a hardware project he had put together: a 2GB array made from USB thumb drives. “If you had some files that you wanted really protected, you only need buy a couple of the [memory] sticks, put them into a little USB hub, and stripe a RAID process. Now, you have a nonvolatile flash memory RAID device?for only $100,” he said.
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