New Technology

Traditionally, fast access data is stored on magnetic disks, and slower access data stored on magnetic tape, CD or DVD disks. Storage requirements are growing rapidly, so storage devices need to store more and more data into a given space. The 1 terabyte disk, and the 1 terabyte tape are both in test, but there is a feeling at some point, the super-paramagnetic limit will prevent magnetic storage devices from growing further.
The super-paramagnetic limit is caused by the interaction between magnetic particles, and limits how close they can be before they start to interfere with each other. The other problem with magnetic disks, is that while capacity is increasing at about 60% per year, the rate at which data can be accessed has just doubled in the last 25 years. So as disks get larger, it takes longer to get all the data off them. Magnetic tape suffers from the same problem.

So are there any new technologies which can help fix these problems? The New Technology section answers this question.

Storage Strategy

What facilities should good storage hardware provide? How would you develop a storage strategy? How can the storage vendors help>

Storage Management

This section discusses the 'soft' side of storage management. How should the storage systems (as opposed to the data) be managed?

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