Home > Storage > PowerStore > Storage Admin > Dell PowerStore: Data Efficiencies > Introduction
Large amounts of data are created by applications daily and ensuring that data is saved in storage efficiently, helps to reduce the overall solution cost. Data efficiency not only reduces the amount of data that is stored, but it also reduces the physical capacity that is required to store the data. Reducing the footprint of the system can also lead to power and cooling savings. PowerStore includes several data efficiency methods to help reduce the total space that is consumed by storage resources created within the system. Utilizing a combination of thin provisioning, deduplication, and compression techniques, PowerStore reduces the amount of data in the system and stores it as efficiently as possible. These features are controlled by the system and are always enabled.
In PowerStore, all incoming I/O for resources that are supported on the system follow the same data path. These resources include, but are not limited to, volumes, file systems, thin clones, and virtual machines that are based on VMware vSphere Virtual Volumes (vVols). The PowerStore data path, which varies by system model, includes deduplication and compression techniques to help reduce the amount of data that is stored within the system. This document describes the PowerStore data efficiency mechanisms in more detail and outlines how space saving is achieved across these resources.