In late June, DataCore was busy promoting virtualized storage solutions for MSPs. Now DataCore Software has developed an automated tiering system for storage disks to be used with its SANsymphony-V 8.0 storage virtualization software. Traditionally, auto-tiering has been exclusive to high-end storage users, the company says. But DataCore’s auto-tiering system claims to be unique because it works across all vendors and systems. It can be applied to any storage solution through an added software layer.

“Customers can create different layers of tiers and let us move their data around based on hot-spots of traffic, or they can pin the data to a certain tier,” said DataCore Software President and CEO George Teixiera. “They [customers] would like to have the most expensive, fastest storage for anything. But the cost is just too high.”

DataCore’s auto-tiering solution was developed after a year of beta tests with clients. During that time, DataCore learned its clients wanted thin provisioning and auto-tiering to realize cost-savings. Those cost-savings depend on a client’s usage and the class of storage they have in place, according to DataCore Software Director of Product Marketing Augie Gonzalez. So the auto-tiering soluti0n was made with a layer of intelligence that stores a client’s most critical data on high-performing solid state disks (SSDs) and less critical data on lower cost disks.