hm. I think the problem is mostly the profit margin. cheap 3tb drives are what $130 each? and you need 333 or so of those to get 1000gb. If you go with, say, 12 disk zraid2 sets, that'd be around 400 disks. Of course, these are 'seagate petabytes' I'm counting, but that's only $52000 for the disk; then, say 10 of the supermicro chassis;
I think you could do it, I mean, at scale where labor costs are mostly amortized out, if you were willing to accept really low margins, or if someone would design and test it for free.
But that's the thing, someone like me? even a cut-rate dedicated server/VPS provider is used to charging around 1/4th to 1/6th the cost of the hardware /every month/ - obviously, this results in margins that are pretty nice by the standards of companies that sell goods with significant marginal costs, at least if you have enough scale that you don't blow it all on labor.
Really, the "big fee up front" model is interesting and warrants a discussion all it's own.
I think you could do it, I mean, at scale where labor costs are mostly amortized out, if you were willing to accept really low margins, or if someone would design and test it for free.
But that's the thing, someone like me? even a cut-rate dedicated server/VPS provider is used to charging around 1/4th to 1/6th the cost of the hardware /every month/ - obviously, this results in margins that are pretty nice by the standards of companies that sell goods with significant marginal costs, at least if you have enough scale that you don't blow it all on labor.
Really, the "big fee up front" model is interesting and warrants a discussion all it's own.