Nirvanix announced the beta of a groundbreaking new set of products that attaches the Nirvanix Storage Delivery Network to a local network as a Windows or Linux filer using standard industry networking protocols. Users can then work with the applications they are accustomed to, or simply drag and drop files from their desktops to Nirvanix’s award-winning storage service.

“Nirvanix CloudNAS represents a significant advancement in cloud storage,” said Patrick Harr, CEO of Nirvanix. “Previously, enterprises could only access cloud storage by programming to an API. Now with CloudNAS, customers can immediately integrate Nirvanix’s cloud storage into their existing applications and processes, and forego new purchases of expensive NetApp, EMC, IBM or other NAS products in favor of Nirvanix’s storage-as-a-service offering.”

Since CloudNAS is built on the Storage Delivery Network, storage administrators can point, click and configure their storage accounts to mirror to one or more locations automatically. This eliminates the need for backups, data migrations and other complexities of data management all at a cost that is a fraction of what it costs with 'storage boxes.'

One recent third-party study of 67 medium to large enterprises indicated that owning and maintaining network attached storage can cost between $15 to $43 per gigabyte per year based on storage class. Based on these costs, the Nirvanix SDN is one-fifth or less the total cost of ownership of typical NAS vendor offerings.

Nirvanix is launching CloudNAS as part of a beta program targeting companies that maintain repositories of archival, backup or unstructured data that requires long-term storage and use, or companies that use automated processes to transfer files to mapped drives. The Linux-based NFS mount version of CloudNAS uses RedHat 5 or Suse 10. The CIFS version of CloudNAS must be installed either on Microsoft Windows Server 2003 or Microsoft Windows XP. Beta testers must be able to test and provide feedback during the beta period. Program participants will be offered special licensing terms to upgrade to the full release following completion of the beta program.

CloudNAS will be available to all Nirvanix customers following successful beta testing.