News
3PAR Policy Advisor Advances Autonomic Cost/Performance Optimisation for Utility Storage
December 2009 by Marc Jacob
3PAR announced 3PAR Policy Advisor for Dynamic Optimisation, new software that adds further autonomic policy management and automation capabilities to 3PAR Dynamic Optimisation for 3PAR InServ® Utility Storage Servers. Policy Advisor works by analysing how the InServ’s virtual volumes use physical disk space. The software then automatically makes intelligent, non-disruptive adjustments to ensure optimal volume distribution and storage tiering across storage server resources.
Introduced in 2005, 3PAR Dynamic Optimisation made it easier for 3PAR customers to align application and business requirements with data service levels flexibly, precisely, and on demand. Dynamic Optimisation also made it possible for InServ users to non-disruptively alter volume parameters with a single click. These parameters include underlying RAID level, subsystem failure protection level, drive type, stripe width, and/or radial placement to achieve optimised data service levels at a lower cost than is possible with traditional storage. Dynamic Optimisation has subsequently become one of the most popular tools among 3PAR Utility Storage customers.
Policy Advisor augments these autonomic management capabilities by adding intelligent analysis and additional automation features designed to further eliminate storage administration time associated with managing quality of service levels. This autonomic management capability is particularly useful for large-scale performance optimisations such as redistributing volumes after capacity is added to an InServ or following the move of a large number of virtual volumes between storage tiers within the array.
3PAR Policy Advisor is optional software available today at no charge with 3PAR Dynamic Optimisation.
