How much does data storage cost? It’s a loaded question. You’re probably well aware that capacity expansion can directly affect the cost of your data storage software.
Let me detail a scenario that would probably be wholly unacceptable to you. This analogy relies on common software that most cars have.
Most vehicles now have embedded software that facilitates and monitors an array of features and functions. Your car probably has software that monitors its health and status, and also controls features like GPS and entertainment. These are important for your daily use of the vehicle.
The software cost may be part of the vehicle’s total price. However, it could also be a separate subscription service, such as satellite radio.
So, imagine how you would react if you had to pay continuing costs to use that software every time you modified your vehicle or added new capabilities. Adding a trailer to haul some things around? That’s an extra charge to the dealer for the vehicle’s software platform.
Replacing wheels and tires with bigger and better ones for winter? More upcharges to use the same software you’ve been using since the day you rolled off the lot.
Installing a moonroof? Cha-ching. The dealer gets even more of your money.
Let’s be honest: after a while, you would probably stop making changes and modifications to your vehicle to avoid incurring any additional upcharges.
Unfortunately, doing that to save money also prevents you from doing what you want with something you’ve already purchased. Chances are you would avoid purchasing a vehicle from that same dealer in the future if ongoing software upcharges were a regular part of the total cost of vehicle ownership.
Given that upcharges are not the best way to generate customer satisfaction, I find it puzzling that the data storage industry not only implements upcharges in this fashion quite frequently, but also that customers truly seem conditioned to accept these additional data storage costs for software usage when their data ecosystem changes.
One of the most common upcharges for data storage involves increased software costs on the amount of storage capacity in use. Imagine what that does to the cost of data storage over time.
Depending on how much storage capacity you’re managing, your average cost of data storage software can be quite variable. Remember, nothing changes with the filesystem software, you’re just managing more data and storage capacity. No extra value—just extra costs!
As with the car software analogy above, this norm of the data storage industry is counterproductive. Customers don’t just add or remove capacity for vanity’s sake or to keep their IT professionals busy. They do so to evolve their data ecosystems to match the needs of their organizations.
In addition, most businesses try to run tight operations, which means effective short- and long-term budgeting as well as cost-cutting on IT tools and services whenever possible. Upcharges for the same tool or service only serve to inhibit their desire to grow and change their data environments. Why do software vendors in the data storage industry want to do that to their customers? Aren’t we in business to help our customers?
OpenDrives rejects the notion that we should put roadblocks in our customers’ way. We’ve instituted a new model for 2024 that allows customers to install our Atlas software on a single controller and manage as much storage capacity as that controller can effectively handle. It enables easy, seamless data storage capacity planning.
Customers who start with a single controller instance and 500 TBs of storage capacity are welcome to add another 500 TBs (or more) without the need to work with OpenDrives to reassess managed capacity and potentially trigger upcharges. To put it bluntly, we at OpenDrives don’t endorse capacity-based upcharges!
We’re committed to an open ecosystem in which our customers can deploy Atlas to work with other third-party technologies via open protocols and standards, to manage as much capacity as they need on a per-controller basis, and to make the right decisions for their businesses.
Contact us to discuss how Atlas software can scale with your business easily, cost effectively, and with high performance always in mind.