NAS storage solutions consists of features and services that make them very cost-effective and budget-friendly, not only at the time of buying but in the long run as well. This is why NAS storage solutions are highly recommended by IT professionals as they provide real value for the price.

In this article, we will discuss some of the key features that make NAS storage solutions affordable and cost-effective.

Data Deduplication

One of the main features of a NAS storage solution is data deduplication. Data deduplication is basically a data service that allows the storage solution to delete any unnecessary and redundant copies of the same file that may be stored multiple times on the system. This significantly saves storage space as whenever a backup is made, copies of the unchanged files are also created which take a lot of storage space and is not ideal for the enterprise.

What data deduplication does is that it allows the system to make maximum use of the available storage space by deleting any duplicated copies of the data which has not changed in any way. By doing so, storage space is not fully used before it should be and the addition of storage nodes and devices can be delayed which will in return save storage costs for the enterprise.

Scalability

Scalability is another important feature in terms of saving storage space and costs. With scale-out NAS, enterprises can add more storage space while staying in the same namespace and without having to purchase a separate storage appliance. This way costs are lowered as adding more storage is less costly as compared to getting a separate storage appliance.

Automated Tiering

All the data which is stored in the storage and is not of the same level of importance as all the other types of data needs to be dealt with. Therefore, there is a need to manage the storage in such a way that the system knows which data should be stored wherein the storage space.

For this purpose, automated tiering is used. Automated tiering makes things a lot easier for IT administrators because they only have to make the policies once for the enterprise. After this, the system automatically places the right data at the right tier after the policies have been made.

The different tiers are normally called hot tier, cold tier and archival tier. Hot tier contains the data that is most frequently used. Then there is the cold tier, in which the data which is not very frequently used, is stored. Lastly, there is archival tier, in which archival data is used in the least frequency.

Depending on the frequency of data needed, it is placed in the tiers of the storage automatically. It saves, storage space, storage administrator’s time and effort and other costs as well.

Conclusion

All the data services mentioned in this article make NAS storage solutions affordable. This not only saves money for the enterprise but also saves time of the IT staff with features like automated tiering and data deduplication.