Server virtualization and cloud storage are the storage solutions which give you the opportunity to use broad storage space without investing your assets in hardware, infrastructure, security systems and IT support. In cloud storage, the storage capacity is obtained via the internet or wide area network. You can use and share the data which is being stored on multiple virtualised servers. Such services are frequently offered by specialized IT companies.

In this way, you efficiently use the space that you need to storage your data and you only pay for the storage capacity actually used. This type of storage solution is also attractive for one more reason – it protects against disasters and ensures business continuity. If the hardware is not located in one place and backups are also stored in various physical spaces, potential failures will not disable the whole system and they are easy to recover from.

The two most popular storage solutions are offered by two types networked storage, NAS (Network Attached Storage) and SAN (Storage Area Network). The first is more suitable for small businesses and home use. It offers access to file based data services to computers on the network. On the other hand, SAN is a storage solution based on a dedicated network through which access to storage devices is available to servers.

Although many opinions favor SAN as the most reliable solution for enterprises in terms of data protection, disaster recovery and maintaining business continuity, many NAS devices also provide such tools. The main issues to address when considering the best storage solutions of course depend on the size of the enterprise and the requirements of the potential customer.

iSCSI (Internet Small Computer System Interface) usually uses Ethernet connectors and cables as its physical transport, but can run over any physical transport capable of transporting IP. Therefore it does not need any additional cabling.

There are many indisputable iSCSI advantages which led to the adoption of this technology by many businesses of various sizes. First of all, this solution is especially popular among small and medium size enterprises. iSCSI resembles Ethernet and is relatively simple to use, without any additional skills. Moreover, unlike other solutions, it is fully compatible with proven Windows or Linux-based NAS technology giving IT the confidence to run any application over iSCSI Nas. While e.g. Fibre Channel holds a small performance edge, the added cost is not worth the performance and renders iSCSI a technology that is enough to meet the company’s expectations since it can fulfill most application performance requirements.

iSCSI offers a possibility to enlarge storage resources. As their capacity grows, many businesses are able to easily scale their storage up with iSCSI while maintaining a storage network that provides low cost maintenance and with minimal support needed. iSCSI is also suitable for businesses which explore cloud storage resources. In enterprises where there is a requirement for access to the same data across distributed environments but the IT resources are limited, it is necessary to transmit and store large amounts of data over their traditional networks – to storage service providers of cloud storage and virtualized devices, iSCSI will also be a solution which should be taken into consideration.

Take care of proper managing of your resources before performing a backup. You can make significantly easier to backup your data if you separate from the beginning your private files from operating system files. Starting from Vista, Windows environment by default saving user’s files in \users\ folder. Previous versions of Windows kept users file in \documents and settings\ folder. Nevertheless it is recommended to drop such a path and keep all personal files on separate partition. This will let you perform periodical backups easily and comfortable.

Try to avoid rare archiving formats. If you choose file format used only by one producer you are completely dependant of them. And it might be tricky if developer will go bankrupt. In longterm perspective it is important to use widely supported formats.

Try to avoid file formats which are requiring specific operating system. In the worst case scenario you will have to restore your archived data on other computer. Having your files archived in common formats such as .rar, .zip, .tar, .bzip, .gz will let you perform this task everywhere. It is also recommended avoiding to create archived and encrypted backups. The only exception would be image of partition or hard-drive because they in general are kept in single container.

Staying organized and secured will ensure growth of your business. With those simple advices you can start to keep your important files safe and stop worrying about your business future.

Here we can choose from many options, which are including also open sources programs. The best of them should allowed us to build a NAS appliance from the standard hardware in less than a 10 minutes. Before we will buy it than we should check if the interface of this program makes it easy to use and it’s packed with a multiple sharing protocols. The best option is also when the NAS software can works on many types of hardware, and it’s flexible for hardware change.

Good NAS software should supports all important file protocols and integrated user and group management, give you top quality technical support, free updates and simply instructions which will allowed us to install and configure it in a few minutes. Another good options is also persistent reservation (SCSI-3 PR) functionality and good Adapter which support high redundancy thanks to Raid.

Such programs can be used in many different areas, for example financial services, healthcare, education and government. Thanks to this we can not only increase functionality of our data but also secure them. This is why we should learn a little more about this. This is a reason why it’s also o good idea to look for some seminars or trainings which can be offer us by a companies which products NAS software. Nowadays it’s hardly to imagine that modern company can live without a lot of information, but it’s also very important to storage it and secure it in the most ideal way. This is why we should infest in a good NAS software solutions.