Rackspace Launches Cloud Block Storage

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Open source cloud computing vendor Rackspace has announced the availability of a new cloud storage offering. Called “Cloud Block Storage,” the service will use a combination of traditional hard drives and solid state drives (SSDs) to meet the needs of customers with I/O-intensive applications.

According to ComputerWeekly’s Archana Venkatraman, “Open cloud provider Rackspace has launched Cloud Block Storage product to help OpenStack cloud users overcome storage-related challenges amid explosion of corporate data. The product will be powered by OpenStack platform and aims to tackle the cloud storage challenges by addressing the demand for consistent and reliable performance for file systems, databases or other input/output (I/O) intensive applications.”

GigaOm’s Barb Darrow reported, “Unlike its current non-OpenStack storage, this offering lets customers mix and match sizes of block storage volumes as needed with their compute instances. ‘We used to offer block storage associated with our cloud servers but it came in pre-defined bundles — large servers got a lot of storage, small servers got a small amount. This decouples that decision,’ Rackspace CTO John Engates said in an interview.”

InformationWeek’s Charles Babcock explained, “Rackspace’s block storage will come with the performance characteristics of either disk drives or solid state devices, with the latter best for high-performance applications. Solid state is also more expensive, at $.70 per GB per month. The standard service, based on disks, will be priced at $.15 per GB per month.”

ZDNet’s Rachel King added, “While Engates responded that Cloud Block Storage could certainly meet SMB needs, he affirmed that it could work for enterprise applications as well — especially those that weren’t really possible to deploy into our cloud before. Engates explained that the linchpin to bringing an enterprise app over is the database, but many customers have been reluctant to move databases to Rackspace cloud environments because they didn’t have the tools to move workloads around very quickly. But with Cloud Block Storage, Engages asserted that this product enables Rackspace to tap into a market that wanted to move workloads around more but couldn’t without this capability.”