| THE ULTIMATE SAN STORAGE APPLIANCE SOLUTION
A Storage Area Network (SAN) is a network designed to attach computer storage devices to servers, and is commonly used in enterprise storage. SANs are normally built on an infrastructure specially designed to handle storage communications.
Storage Area Networks
iXsystems delivers a wide variety of high reliability, high performance SAN storage appliance solutions to meet our enterprise customers needs. SANs increase storage capacity utilization, since multiple servers can share the same growth reserve.
Other benefits of a SAN storage appliance include the ability to allow servers to boot from the SAN itself. This allows for a quick and easy replacement of faulty servers since the SAN can be reconfigured so that a replacement server can use the LUN of the faulty server. This process can take as little as half an hour and is a relatively new idea being pioneered in newer data centers.
A SAN storage appliance also enables more effective disaster recovery processes. A SAN attached storage array can replicate data belonging to many servers to a secondary storage array. This secondary array can be local or remote.
A NAS is a single storage device that operate on data files, while a SAN is a local network of multiple devices that operate on disk blocks.
SAN vs NAS Technology
A SAN commonly utilizes Fibre Channel interconnects. A NAS typically makes Ethernet and TCP/IP connections. SAN is block level storage, and NAS is file level storage.
SAN vs NAS Usage Model The administrator of a home or small business network can connect one NAS device to their LAN. The NAS maintains its own IP address comparable to computer and other TCP/IP devices. Using a software program that normally is provided together with the NAS hardware, a network administrator can set up automatic or manual backups and file copies between the NAS and all other connected devices. The NAS holds many gigabytes of data, up to a few terabytes. Administrators add more storage capacity to their network by installing additional NAS devices, although each NAS operates independently.
Administrators of larger enterprise networks may require many terabytes of centralized file storage or very high-speed file transfer operations. Where installing an army of many NAS devices is not a practical option, administrators can instead install a single SAN containing a high-performance disk array to provide the needed scalability and performance. Administrators require specialized knowledge and training to configure and maintain SANs.
Direct-attached storage (DAS)
Direct-attached storage (DAS) is computer
storage that is directly attached to one computer or
server
and is not, without special support, directly accessible to other ones.
The main alternatives to direct-attached storage are network-attached
storage (
NAS) and the storage area network (
SAN).
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