WSS

Windows Storage Spaces

Developed by Microsoft as a virtual and dynamic disk arrays extension (formerly LDM), it is the most advanced and scalable storage technology for Microsoft Windows operating systems.

Storage Spaces enables cost-effective, highly available, scalable, and flexible storage solutions for business-critical (virtual or physical) deployments. Storage Spaces delivers sophisticated storage virtualization capabilities, which empower customers to use industry-standard storage for single computer and scalable multi-node deployments.

It is appropriate for a wide range of customers, including enterprise and cloud hosting companies, which use Windows Server for highly available storage that can cost-effectively grow with demand.

With Storage Spaces the Windows storage stack has been fundamentally enhanced to incorporate two new abstractions:

  • Storage pools. A collection of physical disks that enable you to aggregate disks, expand capacity in a flexible manner, and delegate administration.

  • Storage spaces. Virtual disks created from free space in a storage pool. Storage spaces have such attributes as resiliency level, storage tiers, fixed provisioning, and precise administrative control.