NAS And SAN ComparisonBoth Storage Area Networks (SANs) and Network Attached Storage (NAS) provide networked storage solutions. NAS and SAN might seem almost identical, and in fact many times either will work in a given situation. After all, both NAS and SAN generally use RAID connected to a network, which then are backed up onto tape. However, there are differences -- important differences -- that can seriously affect the way your data is utilized. For a quick introduction to the technology, take a look at the diagrams below. | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Wires and Protocols Most people focus on the wires, but the difference in protocols is actually the most important factor. For instance, one common argument is that SCSI is faster than ethernet and is therefore better. Why? Mainly, people will say the TCP/IP overhead cuts the efficiency of data transfer. So a Gigabit Ethernet gives you throughputs of 600-800 Mbps rather than 1000Mbps. But consider this: the next version of SCSI (due date ??) will double the speed; the next version of ethernet (available in beta now) will multiply the speed by a factor of 10. Which will be faster? Even with overhead? It's something to consider. The Wires --NAS uses TCP/IP Networks: Ethernet, FDDI, ATM (perhaps TCP/IP over Fibre Channel someday) --SAN uses Fibre Channel The Protocols --NAS uses TCP/IP and NFS/CIFS/HTTP --SAN uses Encapsulated SCSI | ||||||||||||||||||||||
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What's Next? NAS and SAN will continue to butt heads for the next few months, but as time goes on, the boundaries between NAS and SAN are expected to blur, with developments like SCSI over IP and Open Storage Networking (OSN), the latter recently announced at Networld Interop. Under the OSN initiative, many vendors such as Amdahl, Network Appliance, Cisco, Foundry, Veritas, and Legato are working to combine the best of NAS and SAN into one coherent data management solution. |
Monday, March 19, 2012
Nas-San Comparison
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