Mar 24, 2009 : The Planet Launches Storage Cloud

📅 March 24, 2009 - Managed hosting and dedicated hosting provider The Planet (theplanet.com 👉 Total Reviews: 3
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In a conversation with the WHIR, Rob Walters, general manager for The Planet's storage and data protection business said the company looked to customers for input on how the company could expand its storage portfolio. Their primary needs, he says, were for redundancy and reduced download time.

Also key to The Planet's Storage Cloud is the notion of geographic choice. Customers using the product can choose to place their data in The Planet's D2 facility in Dallas - Nirvanix built a node in The Planet's data center as a part of the partnership - or in locations on the East or West Coasts of the US, in Europe or in Asia.

While the product is available to non-customers, when used in combination with a server located at The Planet's D2 facility, the Storage Cloud solution has the performance advantages and flexibility of network attached storage. The company doesn't charge for data uploaded to the Storage Cloud, nor is there a cost associated with transferring data within its facility.

Solutions designed around the idea of "the cloud" are certainly in fashion at the moment. But Walters says the Storage Cloud, while it embraces certain cloud computing notions - such as elasticity, scalability and utility billing - it doesn't completely adopt the notion of replacing infrastructure with SLAs, addressing the lingering need for geographic choice.

The Storage Cloud's pricing starts at 40 cents per GB stored, and 15 cents per GB downloaded (at the on-premise node), and the cost comes down as the customer's data stored scales up. A complete pricing chart is available through the Storage Cloud information page on The Planet's website (via the "sign up now" button).

The site also includes a network map that includes The Planet's data centers and content delivery network nodes along with Nirvanix's storage delivery network nodes.

"With other cloud storage platforms, we hear time and again from customers that invoices are dramatically inflated due to unexpected and hidden transactional fees," says Walters, quoted in the press release. "Our no-surprises philosophy removes the uncertainty. In addition, other companies by contrast offer a one-city cloud storage option, typically resident in their city of operation. Our customers can choose options from multiple replicated global or domestic nodes. With three access methods included with every Storage Cloud account -- including API, Nirvanix CloudNAS or Nirvanix FTP Proxy -- customers can eliminate the development requirements typically associated with other platforms."

Obviously built to compete with existing cloud storage services such as Amazon's S3, the Storage Cloud, says Walters, provides the advantage of being accessible, to Planet server customers, at the speed of network attached storage. The company is also currently developing a white paper in which the Storage Cloud solution compares favorably to other cloud storage solution on both price and performance.

Other advantages of the Storage Cloud, says The Planet include an improvement in security associated with moving data off the server and into the storage area, as well as a cost-effective backup and disaster recovery effect.