Caringo Brings New Level Of Granularity To Data Storage

From the May 11, 2009 issue of InformationWeek

Caringo is positioning its content-addressable storage software as a foundation for internal storage clouds. Its products, especially CAStor, are readily deployed on commodity storage and x86 server gear and bring a new level of granularity to the management, preservation, and protection of data that recommends it for consideration with or without the "cloud storage" marketing rhetoric.

CAStor was developed by the same team that developed the FilePool controller and software later purchased by EMC and implemented as a product called Centera. The developers later reengineered their technology, resolving several nagging problems, and created a hardware-agnostic version that could be leveraged to gain the advantages of Centera but without the huge price tag.

CAStor handily facilitates DIY Marketing's needs for data storage, protection, and preservation/archive. Used in conjunction with collaboration products such as Microsoft SharePoint, Caringo argues that DIY's project-centric data sharing and collaboration needs also can be met.

Caringo's solution doesn't provide DIY Marketing with an alternative to rolling its own storage; in short, this isn't really storage as a service. But it does empower DIY to buy much-less-expensive gear and to provide the data management capabilities it's seeking without the price tag of a name-brand box.

Pricing wasn't disclosed, but licenses are provided on a capacity basis, with additional capacity licenses available for purchase and download from the company's Web site.

Read the complete package of stories on "Evaluating Storage-As-A-Service Options" and download the request for information that was issued to storage-as-a-service vendors here.