Unstructured data is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of more than 60% over the next few years. Enterprises are seeking effective ways to manage this unstructured data and exploit value out of it. High-end Network Attached Storage (NAS) solutions are trying to address these daunting challenges through hardware acceleration and data reduction techniques. These techniques cut the amount of data that needs to be stored and help improve performance.
Based on research conducted in 2016, the Network Attached Storage (NAS) devices market is expected to reach USD 13.2 Billion by 2022. Key drivers for this growth are:
- Increased demand to access data anytime, anywhere, and in any network
- High adoption rate of remote and virtual office environments
- Business continuity planning
- Increased demand for providing employees with remote access to corporate networks
However, this increased adoption of NAS devices has raised concerns regarding the delivery of a fully tested and validated product in the market. Testing of Network Attached Storage (NAS) arrays is a challenging activity and many OEMs find it quite painful to perform non-functional testing such as performance testing. Another challenge is to test how scalable their product is in terms of maximum simultaneous connections. Both these kinds of testing need thorough knowledge of not just the filesystem protocol, but the backend filesystem running on the NAS filer as well as knowledge of client side functions to measure the performance as exhibited by the NAS sub-system. (Ref)
Calsoft, with more than 18 years of experience in storage and testing, has helped multiple customers in testing and validating NAS products. At Calsoft, we take complete ownership of QA engagements and can quickly setup a team with the right skillset; locally or at customer premises. Our ready to use solutions/accelerators help us in expediting product testing efforts. With the right QA practices we have executed more than 200 quality assurance and testing projects.
Some of the work we have done in the NAS testing area includes:
- NFS compliance, functionality, and performance testing
- SMB 2/3 compliance testing
- File system testing
- Test and build automation framework
- Storage sub-systems testing to determine the maximum throughput
- Testing NAS products to ensure data integrity and availability
At Calsoft, we offer flexible engagement models based on specific business requirements put forth by customers. We work with customers in tandem to create a tailor made engagement model which is best suited for their specific requirements. The flexibility we offer provides our customers better control, complete visibility, and better risk mitigation among other benefits. We also understand the criticality of customers’ IP and the need for confidentiality, which is why we follow stringent IP protection processes. At Calsoft, multiple customer projects have been running concurrently without any IP breach being reported in the last 18 years of business.
Contact Calsoft to know more about our NAS testing expertise.
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