Snapshots and checkpoints are excellent for short-term rollbacks before risky changes. What they are not is a replacement for proper backups.
Our latest article by Vladyslav Savchenko for StarWind explains why snapshots fail when storage systems, accounts, or security boundaries fail, and what real Data Protection requires instead. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13t

Deans Computer Services, an England-based IT support provider, relied on a standalone Hyper-V setup with no redundancy, creating a single point of failure for critical workloads. The company required a high-availability (HA) cluster that could be built on its existing hardware without relying on traditional shared storage. By deploying StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN), Deans Computer Services repurposes its servers into an HA cluster, eliminates the single point of failure, and reduces costs, ensuring continuous service delivery to its clients. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13q

Adding power to a single server or expanding with multiple nodes leads to very different outcomes.
Our new article by Ivan Ishchenko for StarWind explains the differences between Scale-Out and Scale-Up and shows when each approach makes sense in modern virtualized and cloud environments. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13n

Windows Server 2025 introduces native NVMe support, removing the long-standing SCSI translation layer.
In our new article by Marius Sandbu, a cloud-native and end-user computing expert, for StarWind, we explain what has changed in the Windows storage stack, how to enable the new NVMe driver, and the impact it can have on workloads like Storage Spaces Direct and SQL Server. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13k

Ascent, LLC, a U.S.-based provider of mission-critical infrastructure services, relied on two standalone servers with no high availability (HA), requiring manual workload shifts and planned outages for maintenance, which put uptime at constant risk. The company needed an easy, affordable way to achieve HA and maintenance flexibility, using only two existing nodes. By deploying StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN), Ascent, LLC adds seamless HA and failover to its two-node Windows Server environment and ensures uninterrupted operations, simplified maintenance, and stronger service continuity for its clients. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13h

Choosing a virtualization platform is a long-term call, not a quick swap. This 2026 guide by Dmytro Malynka for StarWind reviews 10 VMware competitors and highlights strengths, limitations, and the scenarios each platform serves best. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13e

D.F. Pray, a U.S.-based design-build and general contracting company, struggled with slow VM performance and high upgrade costs caused by a non-CSV Hyper-V setup and an aging HPE MSA 2052 SAN with spinning disks. The company needed a cost-effective, high-performance storage solution that would simplify its infrastructure and fully utilize existing server hardware. By deploying StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN), D.F. Pray improves storage performance, simplifies its Hyper-V environment, and achieves reliable CSV clustering and better use of existing hardware, thus reducing operational costs and gaining consistent uptime for daily operations. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/13b

If VMware is no longer a given in your environment, you need a new decision model. Our new 2026 virtualization vendor checklist by Ivan Ishchenko for StarWind explains what to look for in performance, availability, licensing, and the long-term roadmap so you can replatform with confidence. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/138

Hyper-V checkpoints are a lifesaver during testing and patching, but only if they are used correctly. In our latest guide by Karim Buzdar, an IT Engineer & Linux Expert, for StarWind, you will learn how to create, restore, rename, export, and delete Hyper-V checkpoints using both the graphical interface and PowerShell, plus the most important best practices to avoid performance and storage issues. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/135

Wigmore Academy Trust, a U.K.-based educational organization operating a school network, struggled with an aging SAN, high renewal costs, and a complex failover cluster that its small IT team lacked the time and expertise to support. They needed a simple, fully supported hyperconverged infrastructure that improved reliability and removed the burden of constant monitoring and maintenance. By implementing StarWind HCI Appliance (HCA), Wigmore Academy Trust replaces the old SAN setup with an easy-to-manage, fully supported cluster that boosts performance, ensures 100% uptime, and frees the IT team to focus on users. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12z

From a few hours of downtime to just minutes per year, availability “nines” make a huge difference. Learn from our latest article by Vladyslav Savchenko for StarWind how High Availability works and how HA architecture translates theory into business continuity. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12w

Building realistic lab environments usually means more hardware and more cost. Our latest guide by Karim Buzdar, an IT Engineer & Linux Expert, for StarWind shows how to enable Nested Virtualization in Microsoft Hyper-V so a single VM can host its own virtual machines.
It covers host requirements, PowerShell configuration, networking tweaks, and how to confirm that everything works inside the guest system. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12t

Trumid Technologies, LLC, a U.S.-based fintech company, faced an infrastructure risk as its Hyper-V environment was running on end-of-life servers and could no longer provide reliable high availability (HA). The company required a shared storage solution that supports Hyper-V, delivers HA, and allows future expansion to a clustered storage architecture. By deploying StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN), Trumid Technologies, LLC modernizes its Hyper-V infrastructure, achieves HA shared storage on new servers, and ensures stable and easy-to-manage operations for business-critical trading systems. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12q

North Mississippi Health Services-South Marion, a U.S.-based community hospital, faced very high IT costs, including forced hardware refreshes of over $100,000 every 5-6 years, making its Nutanix and VMware infrastructure too expensive to maintain. The organization needed a reliable shared storage solution that could improve operations while allowing it to reuse existing hardware. By deploying StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN), North Mississippi Health Services-South Marion creates a high-availability cluster, gains higher performance and real-time storage redundancy, and saves about $85,000 in capital expenses. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12n

VMware vCenter Converter Standalone is often seen as a legacy tool, but version 9.0 proves otherwise.
Our latest article by Alex Samoylenko for StarWind explains how vCenter Converter fits into modern P2V and V2V migration workflows, what’s new in the latest release, and how it compares to VMware HCX. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12k

Stateful workloads are becoming the norm in Kubernetes environments. Our latest article by Marius Sandbu, a cloud-native and end-user computing expert, for StarWind walks you through VMware Cloud Native Storage (CNS), explaining how CSI, SPBM, and vCenter work together to deliver enterprise-grade storage for containers on vSphere. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12h

Veeam Agent for Windows (Free) is a practical solution for protecting individual laptops and desktops without deploying a full backup infrastructure.
Our latest article by Vladan Seget for StarWind explains how standalone image-based backups work, what’s included in the free Veeam Agent edition, and when it makes sense to move to managed mode for small teams. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12e

COFED, a government body that manages EU-funded development projects in the DRC, relied on a single data server, resulting in long service outages whenever the data center failed. The organization needed a simple and reliable way to keep data synchronized and services continuously available even if one server went offline. By deploying StarWind Virtual SAN (VSAN) in a two-node high-availability cluster, COFED ensured automatic failover and uninterrupted operations with fully synchronized data. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/12b

AI teams often blame models or compute when performance drops, but the real issue is data movement. In 2026, storage architecture directly impacts training speed and overall AI costs.
Our new article by Ivan Ischenko for StarWind explains how AI storage works, why it is needed now, and what to look for when choosing a platform. Read more here: https://starwind.com/s/128