Patent application number | Description | Published |
20100088470 | OPTIMIZING INFORMATION LIFECYCLE MANAGEMENT FOR FIXED STORAGE - The method may query the disk drive for a size where size may be a total number of logical blocks on the disk drive. The drive may receive a size response where the size includes a total number of logical blocks on the disk drive. The number of usage blocks necessary to represent the number of logical blocks on the disk drive may then be determined and usage data may be stored in the usage blocks. The data may be stored in the buffer of the disk drive. The data may also be stored in the DDF of a RAID drive. The data may be used to permit incremental backups of disk drives by backing up only the blocks that are indicated as having been changed. In addition, information about the access to the drive may be collected and stored for later analysis. | 04-08-2010 |
20100185843 | HARDWARE ENCRYPTING STORAGE DEVICE WITH PHYSICALLY SEPARABLE KEY STORAGE DEVICE - Storage devices can provide for hardware encryption and decryption of data stored by them. The hardware cryptographic functions can be applied with reference to cryptographic information of a communicationally, and physically, separable key device. Disconnection of the separable key device can render encrypted data inaccessible. Destruction of the separable key device can result in virtual destruction of the encrypted data. The cryptographic information on the separable key device can be provided by a storage device manufacturer, or by a provisioning computing device. The separable key device can be directly communicationally coupled to a provisioning computing device or it can establish a secure communication tunnel with the provisioning device through a computing device to which the separable key device is communicationally coupled. Cryptographic information can be provided by, and deleted from, the provisioning computing device prior to completion of the booting of that device. | 07-22-2010 |
20100306484 | HETEROGENEOUS STORAGE ARRAY OPTIMIZATION THROUGH EVICTION - A storage system can comprise storage devices having storage media with differing characteristics. An eviction handler can receive information regarding the state of storage media or of data stored thereon, as well as information regarding application or operating system usage, or expected usage, of data, or information regarding policy, including user-selected policy. Such information can be utilized by the eviction handler to optimize the use of the storage system by evicting data from storage media, including evicting data in order to perform maintenance on, or replace, such storage media, and evicting data to make room for other data, such as data copied to such storage media to facilitate pre-fetching or implement policy. The eviction handler can be implemented by any one or more of processes executing on a computing device, control circuitry of any one or more of the storage devices, or intermediate storage-centric devices. | 12-02-2010 |
20100306544 | SECURE COMPUTING ENVIRONMENT IN A TRANSPORTABLE CONTAINER - A secure container can comprise a security server, one or more container servers, and one or more sensors that can detect a breach of the physically secure computing environment provided by the container. A management server external to the container can be informed when the container is sealed and authorized and can subsequently provide a cryptographic key enabling the security server in the container to boot. Each container server can request and receive a cryptographic key from the security server enabling them to boot. If the container is breached, such keys can be withheld and any computing device that is powered off, or restarted, will be unable to complete a subsequent boot. If the container loses a support system and is degraded, so long as the security server does not lose power, it can provide the cryptographic keys to container servers restarted after the degradation is removed. | 12-02-2010 |
20100313044 | STORAGE ARRAY POWER MANAGEMENT THROUGH I/O REDIRECTION - A storage system can comprise multiple storage devices with differing characteristics, including differing power-related characteristics. A storage power manager can redirect Input/Output (I/O) communications to storage devices to maximize the power efficiency of the storage system. The storage power manager can reference metadata associated with the data of an I/O request, as well as power-related data, including continuously varying data and storage device characteristics, to select one or more storage devices to which to redirect the I/O. The storage power manager can also move or copy data between storage devices to facilitate maximum utilization of power efficient storage devices with limited storage capacity and to enable the placing of one or more storage devices into a reduced power consuming state. The moving or copying of data can be performed with reference to lifecycle information to identify data that has changed since a storage device was last active. | 12-09-2010 |
20100313045 | STORAGE ARRAY POWER MANAGEMENT USING LIFECYCLE INFORMATION - A multi-device storage system can be arranged into power saving systems by placing one or more storage devices into a reduced power consuming state when the storage activity associated with the system is sufficiently reduced that an attendant decrease in throughput will not materially affect users of the storage system. Where data redundancy is provided for, a redundant storage device can be placed into the reduced power consuming state and its redundancy responsibilities can be transitioned to a partition of a larger storage device. Such transitions can be based on specific parameters, such as write cycles or latency, crossing thresholds, including upper and lower thresholds, they can also be based on pre-set times, or a combination thereof. Lifecycle information, including lifecycle information collected in real-time by storage devices on a block-by-block basis, can be utilized to obtain historical empirical data from which to select the pre-set times. | 12-09-2010 |
20100318734 | APPLICATION-TRANSPARENT HYBRIDIZED CACHING FOR HIGH-PERFORMANCE STORAGE - Systems, apparatus, and computer-implemented methods are provided for the hybridization of cache memory utilizing both magnetic and solid-state memory media. A solid-state cache controller apparatus can be coupled to a host computing system to maximize efficiency of the system in a manner that is transparent to the high-level applications using the system. The apparatus includes an associative memory component and a solid-state cache control component. Solid-state memory is configured to store data blocks of host read operations. If a host-read operation is requested, the controller communicates with a solid-state cache memory controller to determine whether a tag array data structure indicates a cached copy of the requested data block is available in solid-state memory. | 12-16-2010 |
20100318810 | INSTRUCTION CARDS FOR STORAGE DEVICES - A card can be communicationally coupled to a storage device. The card can then cause the storage device to perform stand-alone tasks without a computing device. The card can invoke instructions already present in the firmware of the storage device or the card can first copy instructions to the firmware and then invoke them. The card can cause the storage device to perform actions, such as a secure erase, and the storage device can remain inaccessible until such actions are performed, even if power is interrupted. The card can also receive information from the storage devices and then use that information with a new storage device to, for example, enable the new storage device to take the place of, and reconstruct the data of, the old storage device in a storage array directly from other storage devices in the array and without burdening a computing device or array controller. | 12-16-2010 |
20100325736 | REMOTE ACCESS CONTROL OF STORAGE DEVICES - An access control device can be communicationally coupled to a storage device and can control access thereto. The access control device can comprise information, such as identities of authorized entities, to enable the access control device to independently determine whether to provide access to an associated storage device. Alternatively, the access control device can comprise information to establish a secure connection to an authorization computing device and the access control device can implement the decisions of the authorization computing device. The access control device can control access by instructing a storage device to execute specific firmware instructions to prevent meaningful responses to data storage related requests. The access control device can also comprise storage-related cryptographic information utilized by the storage device to encrypt and decrypt data. In such a case, the access control device can control access by not releasing the storage-related cryptographic information to the storage device. | 12-23-2010 |
20130125249 | Remote Access Control Of Storage Devices - An access control device can be communicationally coupled to a storage device and can control access thereto. The access control device can comprise information, such as identities of authorized entities, to enable the access control device to independently determine whether to provide access to an associated storage device. Alternatively, the access control device can comprise information to establish a secure connection to an authorization computing device and the access control device can implement the decisions of the authorization computing device. The access control device can control access by instructing a storage device to execute specific firmware instructions to prevent meaningful responses to data storage related requests. The access control device can also comprise storage-related cryptographic information utilized by the storage device to encrypt and decrypt data. In such a case, the access control device can control access by not releasing the storage-related cryptographic information to the storage device. | 05-16-2013 |