HP has announced a highly scalable storage system, designed to simplify the management of multiple petabytes of data at an affordable cost, making it ideal for online and digital media businesses. New business services offered by Web 2.0 and digital media firms – such as photo sharing, streaming media, video-on-demand and social networking – generate massive amounts of file-based data that needs to be stored, managed and retrieved in an instant. Large enterprises in sectors such as oil and gas, security and surveillance, and genetic research have similar demands.

The HP StorageWorks 9100 Extreme Data Storage System (ExDS9100) addresses these requirements by offering vast storage capacity and simplified, integrated management. No other file-based network-attached storage (NAS) system on the market today offers a single management interface while scaling to the multi-petabyte level. With this new system, administrators can easily manage petabytes of storage instead of just terabytes. This reduces the number of administrators and the cost necessary to manage these highly demanding data storage environments.

The ExDS9100 is the first in a series of HP offerings for scale-out environments such as cloud computing, which is an emerging category where services are delivered via the Internet. With an architecture that cost-effectively manages these environments, the ExDS9100 enables customers to deliver new online services or enhance existing offerings to drive new revenue streams.

"Many companies are struggling with file-based growth – not only how to cope with the sheer growth, but also how to leverage their digital and static media to create additional revenue by delivering online services," says Mark Peters, an analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group. "HP is aiming to address these dual market needs, which are much more than just petabyte scalability at an affordable price. Customers are looking for systems that combine scalability with simplified management, ease of use, and all-in-one application support. Put very simply, new business models require usability as much as storability."

The ExDS9100 was designed by HP to provision performance and capacity independently, which leads to greater flexibility in matching capabilities to unique workloads. This helps ensure that critical business applications are always available despite changing environments, such as seasonal customer spikes for online photo sharing companies or increased demand for high-quality streaming video from media and file service providers.

"As business requirements rapidly change and digital media files grow at exponential rates, many enterprises need to manage growth in a way that helps them profit from their storage infrastructure. That’s where the ExDS9100 really delivers," says Dave Roberson, senior vice president and general manager, StorageWorks, HP. "The ExDS9100 is the only complete hardware and software system that provides a flexible and affordable solution for customers with massive capacity needs."