Symantec Ships Data Insight for Storage

Symantec’s Data Insight for Storage software provides a number of functions typically associated with storage resource management (SRM) tools, including capacity consumption monitoring, chargeback, and data utilization reports. (Symantec reserves the term SRM for its flagship CommandCentral Storage SRM product.)

Data Insight for Storage is currently a standalone product that provides visibility and reporting, but Symantec plans to roll the software into Veritas Operations Manager later this year and to integrate it with other products in the Symantec portfolio.

“Today, Data Insight is about visibility and reporting, but in the future we’ll integrate it with Enterprise Vault and Storage Foundation so that users will be able to take action on the data,” says Dan Lamorena, Symantec’s director of storage and availability management.

Lamorena says that Data Insight for Storage may be particularly beneficial to companies deploying cloud storage, either internally or externally. “Data Insight allows you to set the foundation for storage-as-a-service,” he says.

Data Insight for Storage is based on a product (Data Insight) that Symantec introduced about a year ago for security applications.

The software enables administrators to see who created, uses and has ownership of data in unstructured (file-based) environments, and to map users to departments, create capacity consumption reports, and set up chargeback operations. Administrators can also use Data Insight for Storage to determine what data should be archived or deleted, which allows for capacity reclamation.

“The end goals are more efficient use of storage capacity, the ability to make better storage purchasing decisions, and reduced costs,” says Lamorena.

According to Gartner, unstructured data will account for 80% of the growth in data over the next five years.

Data Insight for Storage is priced at $676 per TB, and is currently compatible with NAS systems from NetApp and EMC, as well as Windows-based file servers.

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