National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center Implements Active Archive Alliance

The Active
Archive Alliance announced that the National Energy Research Scientific
Computing Center (NERSC) has implemented a tape-based active archive to support
its growing data storage needs.

NERSC’s active archive is a combined storage solution consisting of storage system software, disk, and tape hardware, which provides a
way for users to access all of their data while ensuring highly reliable
data storage.

NERSC is the primary scientific computing facility for the Office of
Science in the U.S. Department of Energy and supports more than 400 different
projects at any given time. It maintains a growing archive of more than 140
million files and its facility is connected to a network that facilitates the
transfer of large scientific data sets between NERSC and other supercomputing
centers and experimental facilities around the world. With data growth that
typically hovers between 50 to 70 percent each year, the active archive takes
in approximately 50TB of data each day and data is retained an indefinite
period of time.

"We provide some of the
largest open computing and storage systems available to the global scientific
community," said Jason Hick, storage system group lead at NERSC.
"At any given moment, there are
about 35 people logged into the archive system, including users from as far
away as Europe or Asia, to researchers at various universities across the
United States. Our active archive system allows us to support the high read
rates that our users demand while retaining data efficiently, reliably and cost
effectively."

The new active archive provides a way for NERSC’s users to
access all of their data and also simplifies data storage and management for
both researchers and storage administrators.

Exceeding Reliability
Standards
NERSC’s tape-based active archive provides reliable
data storage. NERSC recently replaced its existing tape infrastructure with
newer versions of tape in its active archive, and migrated 40,489 tape
cartridges, which involved reading 22,065,763 meters of tape – the same
distance as flying from San Francisco to Tokyo to Paris to Nova Scotia. The
tapes ranged in age from two to twelve years.

During this massive migration process, NERSC tracked its tape data reliability
within its active archive, and the findings flew in the face of conventional
wisdom: 99.9991 percent of tapes were 100 percent readable, representing a
0.00009 percent error rate and exceeding the industry’s HA measure of ‘five 9’s’
reliability.

"Our recent migration
further validated our belief that tape is reliable, and supported our long-standing
practice of keeping a single copy of data," added Hicks. "This is particularly beneficial for NERSC
given our significant storage capacity and reliability requirements."

"As NERSC’s experience shows, active
archives provide an extremely reliable and efficient infrastructure that keeps
large data volumes online and accessible for users," said Peter
Faulhaber, senior vice president at Fujifilm and an Active Archive Alliance
board member. "What’s more, the
ongoing advancements in data tape technology will allow organizations such as
NERSC to support exponential data growth well into the future, in a reliable
and cost effective manner."