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Pre-show coverage Gartner Symposium Sydney 2003  ZDNet Australia |
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Despite the cost of storage decreasing tremendously, Phil Sargeant, Gartner's research director for Servers and Storage, says the demand for capacity has outpaced the cost erosion.
"In Australia, capacity [demand] is increasing by 70 percent on average although cost continues to decrease at approximately 45 percent per year," Sargeant said.
He said e-mail was the most prevalent growth-driver for storage, with increasingly large files such as audio, video and images, exchanging hands.
The inability to manage data in an efficient manner sums up why organisations are grappling with how to address the spiralling cost of storage systems.
According to Sargeant, the problem lies in storage management tools.
"A lot of information within an organisation sits idle because the tools, such as content management and data mining, aren't mature enough. This results in a lack of information-sharing throughout the entire organisation.
"There's a degree of frustration out there because there aren't adequate tools to manage data effectively," he said.
These tools are crucial to administer information that needs to be stored. "Organisations are not going to be able to increase staff at the same rate as they increase storage capacity so they need automated tools," he added.
Derek Chapman, an IT manager with a Sydney-based IT firm agreed but added the issue goes beyond technology.
"E-mail is a good example. How many people look through last month's messages and pick out which ones to archive?" Chapman asked. Even if there were easy-to-use tools available, and despite proper e-mail policies, it [storage management] will still be challenging, he added.
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