As your business and infrastructure grow, your hardware storage maintenance remains a foundational component requiring meticulous care and maintenance for optimal performance and longevity. Part of your business’ best maintenance practices should include regular backups and disk cleanups.
There are also other lesser-known strategies that can elevate your storage maintenance to new levels. Here’s what to know and how to get started with your storage maintenance needs.
Get on Top of Defragmentation
Defragmentation is a well-known priority in hardware storage maintenance but is often a misunderstood or ignored practice. You’ve probably already done traditional disk defragmentation, but you should take it a step further with specialized defragmentation tools customized for storage media, such as SSDs (Solid State Drives). When used correctly, these tools reorganize data blocks, reducing fragmentation while optimizing your storage performance. When your storage system is well-maintained, it allows for faster, seamless data access.
The issue with handling defragmentation is time and resources. Unless you have a dedicated IT team that can focus exclusively on data management and safety, you need help. The team at Balata One™ can handle all of your hardware storage maintenance needs to protect the integrity of your data.
Employ Temperature Management for Optimal Health
Tech-savvy professionals already know that temperature affects hardware performance, but they often overlook its long-term impact on storage devices. Both can lead to premature storage failure if you have extremely high or low temperatures in your storage docks; combat the issue by ensuring your storage devices are kept in a well-ventilated area with good airflow. You should also consider investing in temperature monitoring software that alerts you when storage temperature exceeds safe limits and could compromise your data.
Stop Silent Data Corruption
Data corruption is a hidden threat that no one likes to think about but can silently deteriorate your stored information without realizing it’s happening. When your data is corrupted, you risk falling out of compliance with industry regulations and losing access to your most valuable assets.
Take a proactive approach with your hardware storage maintenance and implement error-correcting code (ECC) memory modules and storage systems for optimal data integrity checks. Your ECC memory should work to detect and correct single-bit errors, which could stop data corruption in its tracks.
Enjoy Power Supply Protection
You may not realize you’re using an unstable power supply in your business, but ignoring the issue could quickly lead to storage failures. Power surges, voltage fluctuations, and sudden outages are all culprits in corrupt data and damaged storage devices. Instead, your business needs an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system during outages while stabilizing voltage levels during daily operations to protect your hardware from potential harm.
Execute Regular Firmware Updates
Firmware updates are imperative to address critical bug fixes and improve performance. Yet many businesses overlook these updates because they assume their hardware works fine. The results? You could end up hindering optimal storage performance while exposing your data to risk. Balata One™ can monitor your hardware while updating your storage devices and hardware to enhance security and performance.
Implement Redundancy Strategies
Your redundancy strategies should surpass traditional backups and RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) configurations. Your business also needs innovative solutions like data mirroring, maximizing cloud storage, and implementing erasure coding techniques across multiple devices. You ultimately safeguard your data against hardware failure, natural disasters, and other emergencies.
Next Steps
Basic precautions are a good start to protecting your data, but there’s more to address with hardware storage maintenance. Work with the team at Balata One™ to prioritize your hardware storage maintenance needs and protect the integrity of your data and business. We offer flexible service plans, including everything from remote monitoring to deploying an expert technician to your business within hours. Contact us today to discuss your business and data needs.