Sans Digital Active Cluster Mirroring Feature

Sans Digital is launching the Active-Cluster Mirroring feature to its EliteNAS.

The Active Cluster Mirroring feature is a NAS-to-NAS mirroring element that provides active-active load-balancing and fail-over of either two or four EliteNAS head units.

In the event of a head node server failure, the secondary server automatically takes over to service the failed head node server. The Active-Cluster Mirroring feature ensures continuous service with virtually no down time for both IT administrators and end-users alike.

In a normal NAS setup, if the device cease functioning, client computers are no longer able to access data stored on the NAS unit (Single Point of Failure). The EliteNAS Active Cluster Mirroring is design to eliminate single point of failure by providing HA continuous network data service. In the event of a failure to either the primary or secondary EliteNAS unit, the failover feature will automatically switch to the other active redundant EliteNAS unit. And since the redundant EliteNAS contains the exact settings and data as the failed server, the client’s migration from the failed server to the secondary NAS is unnoticeable. Upon the replacement of the failed NAS unit, it can be re-deployed as either secondary or primary NAS. The failover is automatic and provides continuous availability and reliability.

The Active Cluster Mirroring offers an EliteNAS-to-EliteNAS data redundancy where the primary and secondary servers are connected via Gigabit Ethernet ports or 10GbE Ethernet controllers for dedicated data replication.

As data is written, modified, or deleted to the primary EliteNAS, the secondary EliteNAS updates its data in real-time, before accepting the next request. The primary device replicate itself to the secondary EliteNAS server thus ensuring the configuration and data are always the same. Since this operation is done through the dedicated Gigabit Ethernet or 10GbE Ethernet port, client access speed and response time to and from the primary NAS will not be affected.

In the active/active mode, network traffic can direct to primary and secondary EliteNAS to achieve double (with 2 EliteNAS) or quadruple (4 EliteNAS) amount of performance. The Active Cluster Mirroring feature is a real time, synchronized, block level, volume base data replication with automatic fail-over from one node to another node. It can be viewed as if a RAID-1 across two or four EliteNAS units over LAN.

The Active Cluster Mirroring feature provides HA and uninterrupted data service in the event of NAS unit failure eliminating a single point of failure.

"The add-on feature of the Active Cluster Mirroring to the existing popular EliteNAS product line will provide user a higher degree of reliability and availability in a mission critical environment without a big budget." said Stanley Chan, Director of Business Development.

The Sans Digital Active Cluster Mirroring (ACM) feature is available via ACM licenses (Part#: SW-SAN-ENACM) purchases for CIFS and NFS protocol in EliteNAS 2U or above product line. No additional hardware is required, but additional gigabit ports or 10GbE connection ports are recommended for increase ACM.

Built-in iSCSI is available by the end of Q2 of 2012.

The Sans Digital family of NAS solutions is backed by a limited warranty that includes Phone and Email technical support.