Case Study: Youth Villages achieves 50% lower storage costs and 30x faster performance with Microsoft Corporation Storage Spaces Direct

How cheaper, faster storage helps this nonprofit do more for troubled youth

Youth Villages, a U.S. nonprofit serving more than 22,000 emotionally troubled children and families each year, was struggling with an overextended and expensive storage area network that slowed staff productivity and delayed critical data uploads. The organization needed a more affordable, higher-performing solution, and worked with Microsoft Corporation using Storage Spaces Direct in Windows Server 2016 Datacenter, with DataON hardware as part of the deployment.

Microsoft Corporation helped Youth Villages replace the old SAN with a software-defined storage cluster built on four DataON all-flash servers. The new system cut storage costs in half, saving $150,000, and improved storage performance by 30 times, speeding up syncs and uploads while freeing more budget for staff and programs.

Youth Villages

Cliff Reyle

Chief Human Resource and Information Officer