AP boosts access to HD content with EMC Isilon scale-out storage platform

Singapore - The Associated Press (AP) has deployed EMC Isilon scale-out NAS to support the Big Data demands of its high-definition video production and archive workflows. By implementing a single EMC Isilon system and software, AP has boosted the performance of copy and transfer rates, streamlined storage management, improved reliability, and lowered its video archive storage costs up to 45% per terabyte of HD video content, without compromising on any of these dimensions. Although EMC Isilon was initially deployed specifically for AP’s video editing workflow, the news organization soon began using Isilon to archive content as well, realizing significant cost savings.

As newsgathering organizations continued transitioning to HD video in 2011, AP needed to upgrade its standard-definition video content offerings. However, the tape-based video archival system AP had deployed for standard-definition video was not up to the task of handling more performance-intensive HD content. The tape system had a high per-terabyte cost, sluggish access and transfer rates, and failed 10 to 15 percent of the time. In addition, every few years tape technology changes, requiring organizations to convert existing tapes to make them compatible with the latest standards.

EMC Isilon allows AP to aggregate all storage assets into one pool, assign users appropriate levels of service, and easily perform other storage management tasks. It also enables AP’s transition from four storage tiers to two (object-level and block-level). EMC Isilon delivers a 6X video copy and transfer rate performance increase over AP’s previous tape archival system, and provides 99 percent reliability vs. AP’s legacy tape-based system, which failed 10 to 15 percent of the time.

EMC Isilon scale-out architecture and management software will enable AP to seamlessly and effortlessly scale from about 800 terabytes today to about 2.5 petabytes by mid-2013 and add capacity and boost performance as needed.