Server computers often include one or more input/output (I/O) devices for communicating with a network or directly attached storage device. Data transferred between these devices may include blocks of data with a common often repeated and identifiable data pattern. Transfer and storage of data of this nature may be optimized by transferring primarily blocks of data that are not of the pre-determined data pattern. An indicator may be transferred and stored with transferred data that has been reduced in size in this manner.