LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY
ATLANTA, GEORGIA
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
CINCINNATI, OHIO
DENVER, COLORADO
MADISON, WISCONSIN
RARITAN, NEW JERSEY
TORONTO, ONTARIO
NOIDA, INDIA
HYDERABAD, INDIA

V-Soft's Corporate Headquarters

101 Bullitt Lane, Suite #205
Louisville, KY 40222

502.425.8425
TOLL FREE: 844.425.8425
FAX: 502.412.5869

Denver, Colorado

6400 South Fiddlers Green Circle Suite #1150
Greenwood Village, CO 80111

TOLL FREE: 844.425.8425

Chicago, Illinois

208 N. Green Street, #302, Chicago, IL 60607

TOLL FREE: 844.425.8425

Madison, Wisconsin

2810 Crossroads Drive, Ste. 4000
Madison, WI 53718

TOLL FREE: 844.425.8425

Atlanta, Georgia

1255 Peachtree Parkway Suite #4201
Cumming, GA 30041

TOLL FREE: 844.425.8425

Cincinnati, Ohio

Spectrum Office Tower 11260
Chester Road Suite 350
Cincinnati, OH 45246

Phone: 513.771.0050

Raritan, New Jersey

216 Route 206 Suite 22 Hillsborough Raritan, NJ 08844

Phone: 513.771.0050

Toronto, Canada

1 St. Clair Ave W Suite #902, Toronto, Ontario, M4V 1K6

Phone: 416.663.0900

Hyderabad, India

Incor 9, 3rd Floor, Kavuri Hills
Madhapur, Hyderabad – 500033 India

PHONE: 040-48482789

Noida, India

H-110 - Sector 63 ,
NOIDA , Gautham Budh Nagar ,
UP – 201301

Data Migration Made Faster and More Secure with AWS Snowball

Migrating Data with AWS Snowball

Migrating data is a crucial task for businesses. Data migrations or transfers back and forth to the cloud is one of the most frequent actions for a business. The complexity in data transfer increases with data size and somewhere around tera or pica bytes, transfer time is very high. To transfer data, businesses usually have to work with additional hardware and coding efforts or use third-party applications, which costs time and money. To ease the process of data migration, AWS' Snowball device  makes data transferring faster.

What is AWS Snowball and How Does it Help?

To improve the data transfer process, AWS created Snowball which is a a physical device. Snowball features enable businesses to execute faster data transfers with no hassle. Businesses can get a Snowball device by going to the AWS management console and raising a job. The device will be shipped to your location. One can conduct localized data transfers between on-premise data centers and a Snowball. This can be achieved either using the Snowball client application or by using S3 Snowball adapter, which is programmed with REST API calls. To conduct the transfer, connect the device to your network, download and run Snowball client and select the files to be transferred to the device. 

How AWS Snowball Works

Figure: How AWS Snowball Works

The Snowball Client application notifies you of the time  it will take to complete the transfer process. In the entire transfer process, no demand for additional hardware or coding efforts exists. To ensure data security during the transfer and during transit from one location to the other, it uses industry standard 256-bit encryption and a Trusted Platform Module. After the transfer is complete, the E Ink shipping label will be generated, and one can track the device with Simple Notification Service or the status can be monitored via the AWS management console. 

Chart explaining when to use Amazon AWS Snowball

Table: Snowball Transfer speeds and when to consider Snowball

Key Aspects to Understand Prior to Using Snowball

  • If your business isn’t willing to spend on costly upgrades to network infrastructure, huge data backlogs will be stored in remote location. Snowball can be used to conduct faster data transfers.
  • Due to internet connectivity issues or slower speeds,  it can take more than a week to upload data to AWS services. 
  • There is no restriction for the amount of data that can be transferred with Snowball, from a few terabytes to any number of petabytes. In such cases, you may have to have more than one Snowball device.
  • One cannot use Snowball to migrate data from one AWS region to another.
  • Data transfers must be completed within 90 days of a Snowball's job creation.

Snowball SpecificationsTable about AWS Snowball Specifications and requirements

Preparing for a Data Migration with Snowball

Ho to prepare for a data migration using Snowball:

Importing data

  • Setup an AWS account with IAM administrator-level permissions
  • Name files to be transferred, this should be per-object key naming guidelines for Amazon S3
  • Develop a plan on what data will be imported

Exporting data from S3

  • Understand what data is exported. Be aware of the data migrated when job is created
  • If file names having colons, they cannot be exported to a windows server, rename any files with colons prior to creating an exporting job 

Jobs using compute instances

  • Before adding Amazon Machine Images (AMI) to your job, make sure an AMI is created in the AWS account and prior to adding AMI to the job
  • Connecting to hosts through SSH requires usage of SSH key pairs. Similarly when connecting to instances running on Snowball Edge, SSH key pairs are mandatory for connecting to instances. (Refer to list AWS EC2 compute instances AWS Snowball Edge device.)

The Definitive Guide for AWS Cloud Migration

Topics: AWS, AWS Snowball, Data migration

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