BCD, a provider of IP video data infrastructure solutions, has announced the expansion of its virtualized infrastructure solutions with vSTORE, a solution that leverages virtual machine technology to optimize the utilization of system resources and reduce total cost of ownership.

With vSTORE, a common storage point acts as a centralized storage location for all files that make up the virtual machine. This centralized storage location is comprised of high-speed SAN storage, allowing for VM migration upon failure between nodes. With vSTORE, the virtual machines, as well as primary and secondary storage, are all SAN-based. Due to this, the recording server only needs enough local storage available to install ESXi in a highly available, resilient deployment.

In the event of a node failure, vSTORE migrates all virtual machines to the remaining nodes, completely eliminating the risk of downtime. With the ability to run all access control, building management and video management systems on the system, vSTORE also eliminates the need to run multiple appliances while providing resiliency – even to systems that do not natively support failover. Additionally, virtualization inherently leads to a reduction in the amount of bare-metal hardware purchased as resources on the server are used more efficiently.

According to BCD, vSTORE differs from hybrid HCI solutions by eliminating the additional costs of VMware and vSAN licensing, as well as reducing the complex infrastructure of hybrid HCI solutions. vSTORE delivers the same benefits as REVOLV hHCI at a fraction of the cost.

vSTORE provides security professionals with video management systems (VMS)-agnostic high availability for virtual machines, regardless of the native capability of the software being deployed on the virtual machines. In addition to high availability, vSTORE:

• Does not require local storage on the server, just enough storage to deploy ESXi
• Can create two-node highly available clusters without the requirement of a passive witness node at an independent location
  • Additional nodes may be added to increase the number of virtual machines that can be deployed

Paired with BCD’s Deepstor SAN storage solutions, vSTORE provides robust, scalable and easy-to-deploy external storage. Deepstor provides security professionals with a user-friendly interface that makes installation, configuration and system management simple for anyone in a company, regardless of technical experience.

BCD says that vSTORE is ideal for any environment requiring maximum system up-time and a self-healing systems architecture.