BackBlaze Presents Their Bare-Bones, $7348, 135TB Storage Pod For Backup On The Cheap
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We covered BackBlaze’s cloud-based backup system way back in 2008, when $5 for unlimited storage must have sounded like a Christmas present. Since then the business has matured somewhat, but one thing they nailed that perhaps has become more important is scaling the hardware. With cloud backup and media services firing on all cylinders, data storage space is more valuable than ever, and providing the terabytes and petabytes of space is increasingly important to emerging companies.
In 2009 BackBlaze was kind enough to let everyone in on the top-secret design specs for their “Storage Pod,” the custom server unit that they claimed made their prices possible (CEO Gleb Budman explains in this Ignite talk). And now they’re doing it again. Want to build your own ultra-low-cost storage solution for far less than the likes of Dell and HP? They’ve done the legwork and provided a part-by-part breakdown.
Many items from the previous build are no longer available, which makes things difficult both for them and for aspiring cloud lovers. The new parts will likely die out in two years or so, but if anything the primary cost (the drives) will go down and the capacity will go up, while the other parts (motherboard, RAM, etc) will remain sufficient.
An unavoidable consequence is the greater magnitude of unit failure, but that’s something that can be controlled by redundancy at a huge scale, and certainly there are algorithms and top-secret software that make avoiding data loss like that a snap. I guess if a SATA controller were to go rogue (or something, I don’t know), even 135TB of lost data is manageable if you’ve taken the correct precautions. And the far more likely failure here (drives) don’t seem to be at any additional risk.
The benefit of having lower cost hardware is obvious, but I think there’s something more to it than saving money. Being the master of your domain counts for something: BackBlaze is in control of their hardware in a way many companies aren’t, and they aren’t beholden to, say, Amazon or Dell for support or maintenance. Plus every part is easily replaceable and they designed the system (it’s really quite straightforward, not to say easy) so they know it top to bottom. Maybe it’s that forward-thinking leanness that almost got them bought?
You can read far more technical details (such as file system changes and cluster stats) at BackBlaze’s blog. I build my own systems as well, and while I don’t have eight grand lying around to replicate their baby, I do like their style.