Post-production company requirements fueling adoption of Fusion File Share by Tuxera to enable real-time networked data access for vfx, animation and other high-bandwidth studio operations

Ultra-fast Fusion File Share SMB software unlocks the stifled potential in state-of-the-art server and storage hardware, giving media and film companies new power to realize their creative visions for ultra-high definition, high frame-rate video content

LAS VEGAS, April 12, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Tuxera, the creator of software products for networked file management and transfer, today announced its network access technology is enabling media and entertainment companies to get more stunning and effects-laden video content more quickly from the editing suite to consumers' screens.

The Fusion File Share by Tuxera™ server message block (SMB) server software for the Linux^® operating environment is the secret key that unlocks the awesome power and performance trapped in today's high-performance computing hardware and software-defined storage systems. Tuxera's software opens up a bottleneck at the networked data access layer of the stack that post-production companies use to feed video to the editing suite. When Fusion File Share by Tuxera replaces the standard SMB solutions that are normally loaded in storage infrastructure by default, the data transfer roadblock disappears.  

Now, studio technicians can work on the most demanding editing and production processes in real time, even when processing uncompressed 8K 60 FPS content. The familiar experience of lag and downtime while editors wait for high-resolution video files to transfer across the network and load disappear, freeing time for studios to create the greatest possible video products and realize the most ambitious creative visions.

'When we originally tested Fusion File Share, I had no idea what it was capable of,' says Veikko Ruuskanen, CEO of Toast Post Production Oy, a full-service post-production house in Helsinki, Finland. 'We always prefer to play back raw material on our workstations in real time, regardless of the resolution or file format. Unfortunately, that was not always doable with equipment running SAMBA SMB server software. At times, we needed to create local caches which slowed down the workflow, frustrating both our artists and our clients. With the Fusion File Share software, we found that we could instantly manage real-time transfers of the most demanding file types. The change was immediate.'

Visitors to the NAB Show (Las Vegas, NV, 13-17 April 2024) can hear more about the boost to post-production workflows which Fusion File Share by Tuxera offers in a joint presentation from Tuxera, Toast Post Production, and Pixitmedia, a leader in software-defined storage and data management solutions for Media & Entertainment. The presentation will be held on 15 April 2024 at 3 pm local time at the SU4087 Create Zone Theater.

NAB Show visitors can also visit Tuxera's booth SL10051 (South Hall Lower) to see Fusion File Share by Tuxera performing ultra-high speed networked file accesses from storage. Tuxera technical staff will be on hand to explain how storage providers can enable the latest exciting production effects for their media and entertainment customers by addressing the bottleneck in their data access layer.

Beating industry performance standards for networked data access

The Fusion File Share software provides a dramatic uplift in the speed, throughput and reliability of networked data access for all workflows performed in media and entertainment studios, editing suites and post-production facilities, including:

• Color grading
• Vfx
• Animation
• Motion tracking

With Fusion File Share by Tuxera running on state-of-the-art hardware and software storage systems from Tuxera's partners, studio technicians can perform concurrent processes such as color grading and video editing on raw 8K video feeds with no loss of definition, and with data throughput typically exceeding 10GB/s.

Antti Alila, VP of Enterprise Solutions at Tuxera, said: 'Just one simple change can unlock the full potential of your content storage and network bandwidth. Fusion File Share by Tuxera – our high-performance SMB protocol solution – is transforming the work of production studios and video technicians in the media and entertainment industry, producing huge improvements in efficiency and productivity. We know that studios are putting heavy investments into the best workstations, the best effects software, the highest bandwidth networks, and the best storage hardware and software. All those investments essentially go to waste if at the protocol level the system cannot scale and deliver the needed throughput.'

'Now technology will not get in the way of studios making whatever effects they can imagine.'

How Fusion File Share by Tuxera works

Fusion File Share by Tuxera connects the users of data over networks to storage servers, continuously providing high throughput while maintaining data integrity regardless of the status of the infrastructure over which data are transferred. The most widely used alternative to the open-source SAMBA software, Fusion File Share offers up to 60x higher throughput and as much as 500% better scalability. Compatible with the SMB protocol up to version 3.1.1, Fusion File Share also offers RDMA capability.

In addition, its scale-out feature enables the creation of parallel and scalable multi-SMB cluster service, providing faster throughput with low CPU and memory usage.

Internally validated test data demonstrate the superior performance of Fusion File Share when handling multimedia workloads such as ultra-high definition video. The results were derived from a live staged concert set-up consisting of a 16K x 16K, 60fps video livestream to a giant display screen from 27 storage nodes via media servers with active-active scale-out SMB and storage clustering. The application required zero frame drops or latency, to give concert goers an uninterrupted, immersive viewing experience while maintaining throughput for an event lasting for several hours.

In a major storage provider's cluster running Fusion File Share with RDMA enabled, the file sharing system fully saturated the network with data transfers running at up to 412GB/s. The Fusion File Storage software's low resource usage also enabled SMB service directly on the storage nodes, with no requirement for protocol nodes or extra hardware.

For more information about Tuxera and Fusion File share, go to www.tuxera.com.

About Tuxera

Tuxera is the leading provider of quality-assured embedded storage management software and networking technologies. Helping people and businesses store and do more with their data, our software is at the core of phones, tablets, cars, TV sets, cameras, drones, external storage, routers, spacecraft, IoT devices, and more. We help you store your data reliably, while making file transfers fast and content easily accessible. Tuxera is also an active member of multiple industry organizations, including JEDEC, AGL, SD Association, The Linux Foundation, and many others. Founded in 2008, Tuxera's headquarters are located in Finland, with regional offices in China, Germany, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and the US.

Linux^® is the registered trademark of Linus Torvalds in the U.S. and other countries.

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