The Windows team at Microsoft recently utilized end-to-end customized solution provider RAID Inc.’s 4U 60-Bay SAS (News - Alert)/SATA EBOD devices with its Windows Server 2012 Datacenter operating system in an effort to create a cost-effective and highly functional scalable storage solution.

Currently, the team is using 14 of RAID's 4U 60-Bay SAS/SATA EBOD drive enclosures featuring 60 3-terabyte near-line serial-attached SCSI disks. While this will provide 1.1 petabytes of storage, the team will soon have access to 1.5 petabytes after an additional six servers are put in place. Additionally, they will be able to decrease the total number of servers that manage storage from 120 to 20 upon the completion of its Window Server 2012 Storage Spaces infrastructure.

"With Storage Spaces, we have the functionality of a SAN without the cost of a SAN," Jeremy Russell, senior development lead of the US Windows engineering team at Microsoft (News - Alert) said. "We're able to use commodity hardware to achieve the same functionality at a far lower cost."

RAID believes Microsoft will see many benefits through the use of its services.

"Our current line of certified and cost-effective EBOD solutions combined with Storage Spaces is helping Microsoft to get more capabilities for every storage dollar all the while reducing the overall amount of physical storage," Bob Picardi, CEO of RAID.

In other Microsoft news, the company recently revealed that it will end support for its Windows XP and Office 2003 products. While this will stop these product users from receiving security updates or tech support from Microsoft, they will be able to enhance the security and productivity of its IT infrastructure by upgrading to Windows 7 and Windows 8.

Microsoft has also announced that it will improve security for its E-mail, storage and other services through a two-step verification process. This means that in addition to requiring a username and password to access a service, individuals will need to enter more information such as a temporary code sent as a text message.