The purpose of this document is to explain the basic differences of these file storage options and their use as repositories in Business Objects Cluster configurations Storage area networks (SANs), SAN/WAN connectivity, and Internet Protocol (IP)-based storage networks are key technologies that promise to expand the boundaries of traditional data storage. If you dig a little deeper, when a file read/write request is send to a NAS share attached to a server, the request is sent in the form of a CIFS(Common internet file system) or NFS(Network File system) requests over the network. A NAS system acts as a NAS device, with storage traffic being routed across a LAN. This post will cover SAN and NAS, the characteristics of these storage protocols, and why someone might pick one protocol over the other. For workloads which have high amounts of duplication and compressible data (such as virtualised environments where multiple virtual machines have the same operating system, patches and applications) this can give huge savings in the amount of disk space required. For a Windows server, you’ll probably be using NTFS. She holds many industry certifications including CISSP, NCIE-SAN, and Linux+. With the advent of the NVMe protocol and development of NVMe over Fabric, the performance benefits of SAN storage protocols are game-changing. storage area network (SAN): A storage-area network (SAN) is a dedicated high-speed network (or subnetwork ) that interconnects and presents shared pools of storage devices to multiple servers . But a typical difference between SAN and NAS is that, a NAS is a single storage device which operates on data files, whereas SAN is a local network of multiple devices which operate on disk blocks . Snapshots consist of pointers to the original blocks on disk rather than being a new copy of the data, so they initially take up no space and occur nearly instantaneously. NAS is a storage protocol of unstructured data. External SAN and NAS storage is provided by companies such as NetApp, Dell EMC, IBM and Hitachi Data Systems. Also, with the rapid improvements in disk storage technology, NAS devices now offer capacities and performance that once were only possible with SAN. To an end device like a server, these LUNs look like direct-attached-storage (DAS) or a local drive. Let's say that I've got 10 servers, and I think that they might need up to 500GB of storage space each. If data gets corrupted or somebody accidentally deletes a file then we can very quickly recover. Her enthusiasm for all things tech and her desire to share knowledge has earned her the unofficial title "Trainer of Sys Admins" for her team. So if I've got some servers that require 300GB disk space, I give them 300GB disk space. These NAS systems are inexpensive -- with some consisting of only a single hard drive -- and easy to configure. Thinking of reasons not to use a storage area network (SAN) will not make the technology go away. We can replicate data from our main site to a disaster recovery site giving us a backup if the main site fails. You can get the entire series for free here: Copyright 2020 flackbox.com | Privacy | Affiliates | Contact Me | Testimonials | Reviews, Building your Cloud and Data Center career, The 11 Top Benefits of SAN and NAS Storage, Click here to get the Introduction to SAN and NAS Storage course, Flackbox Intro to SAN and NAS Storage student - click here to enroll, https://www.flackbox.com/introduction-to-san-and-nas-storage. Fitting larger disks in a server will require an outage and is really inconvenient. I didn’t realize how much there was to know, and how different it was from your typical networking. A File Level storage system is the most common storage system that we find with our hard-drives, NAS systems, etc. Scroll down for the video and also text tutorial. The advantages of NAS [EMC09]: Support comprehensive access to information Improves efficiency Improved flexibility Centralizes storage Simplifies management Scalability The advantages of SAN [Gou13]: Better disk utilization SAN for disaster recovery for multiple applications For improving the availability of the application SAN can … The killer feature of virtualisation software is the ability to move virtual servers between physical servers on the fly while they are still running. • DAS service is limited to particular host and it can not be used by otherhosts until it is made available to them … To get a smaller LUN, you would need to re-create that LUN and move all of the storage to the new smaller LUN. Because SAN offers fast, resilient storage, it is frequently the storage protocol of choice for databases and other high-performance applications. And I move from 'Just In Case' to 'Just In Time' - saving money because I don't need to buy the physical disks until they're actually required. Advantages to using NAS protocols include easier management and the ability to leverage your existing network infrastructure. Typically, storage traffic is segregated from general purpose network traffic. The 11 main benefits of external SAN and NAS storage are: Most people see this as being the main benefit of SAN and NAS storage. BY RON LEVINE. Let's say that the servers are only going to initially be using 200GB of storage space each. If you serve data using the SAN protocol, you may have specialized hardware for transporting storage area network traffic. We can have a Linux web server, Exchange mail server and SQL database server all running on the same physical box for example, and this is transparent to each of those virtual servers. The key benefits of network-attached storage are mainly speed and convenience. Let's say that I've got 10 servers, and I … Find out the advantages and disadvantages of storage-area networks (SANs) and network-attached storage (NAS). Separate hardware is actually an advantage to using SAN as a storage protocol. Potential server capabilities include: Fantastic course for someone who is already in IT and looking to get involved with storage networks. In this type of storage, the storage disk is configured with a particular protocol (Like NFS, etc) and files are stored and accessed from it as such, in bulk. Snapshots are a point in time copy of the file system which can be used as a convenient short term backup. We can keep hot data which is accessed frequently on the SSDs, and older archived data on the SATA drives. Benefits of SAN Technology A major advantage of using a SAN is its improved disk utilization. Centralised storage systems are always built to have very high degrees of resiliency because they will almost always be mission critical systems for the enterprise. Home » Tutorials » SAN and NAS Storage Basics » The 11 Top Benefits of SAN and NAS Storage. Smaller than servers and save more space in the office NAS devices are much cheaper than servers NAS devices can be used to host applications with ease of access NAS devices can also be used to automatically create locally stored backups of your business data NAS simplifies file sharing and collaboration among multiple users You just have to determine whether the investment is worth the reward. 1. A caveat to block storage is that you need to format the drive with an operating system-specific file system. It’s the typical client-server architecture. Similarly I can use compression at the file level to reduce the amount of space used and get the same benefit. It uses high-end speed technology with fiber optics by which client and server communication becomes fast. However, you probably will have specialized converged network adapters (CNAs) on your hosts that offload some of the processing from the host’s CPU. NAS appliances share the network with their computing counterparts and hence the NAS solution consumes more bandwidth from the network. If we've got 50 servers, it's much easier to manage the storage for them all if that's on one centralised system, rather than distributed individually to each of those 50 servers. A server is not dramatically different from a regular personal computer, but it serves a different purpose. Over the last several weeks, we’ve taken a close look at several network attached storage (NAS) ... We hope we’ve made our point about the benefits of owning a NAS unit. • As shown, DAS system is directly attached to server or workstation.It does not require any storage in between them. 10 servers x 500GB storage = 5TB of total capacity required. Your out-of-control storage needs aren’t going away either. This presentation outlines the benefits of networked storage, contrasting the different options. When we use centralised storage, we can get a figure which is closer to 80%. The key difference between SAN and NAS is that SAN is a block level data storage while NAS is file-level data storage.. Today’s technology has advanced so much that it has made our lives a lot easier and comfortable to live in. Advantages of NAS. This mean that the virtual servers can keep on running with no outages even if it's underlying physical server fails or is taken down for maintenance. Another caveat is, depending on the file system, you may be limited to having a single host read and write data. The single volume is shared among multiple hosts (clients). If you’re a network or system administrator and are looking to experiment with something a bit different, this course will make sure you know the fundamentals of how a SAN is supposed to work. Let's say that we have 50 servers which we expect will each require 300GB of storage space. Provides better storage replication. Typically I can do this non-disruptively. If we're consolidated on centralised storage then we can centralise our backup solution as well which is much easier to manage. However, NAS is Ethernet-based, while SAN can use Ethernet and Fibre Channel. It was the age of SAN, it was the age of NAS. The key benefits of network-attached storage are mainly speed and convenience. If later on it turns out that they need more space then I can easily give them it when they need it. Direct Attached Storage SAN Storage NAS Storage . 10 Advantages of SAN vs. DAS. Active IQ is here to help. Also, the performance of the NAS will depend upon the amount of bandwidth available. External storage is a requirement for this feature. Advantages of using NAS. Dis-advantages of Network Attached Storage (NAS, compared to SAN): Transaction intensive databases, ERP, CRM systems and such high performance oriented data are better off when stored in SAN (Storage Area Network) than NAS as the former creates a network that has low latencies, reliable, lossless and faster.Also, for large, heterogeneous block data transfers SAN might be more … All of these blocks of data are stored in Logical Unit Numbers or LUNs. NFS, SMB, and CIFS (legacy SMB 1) all fall into the NAS protocol category. 10 servers x 200GB storage = 2TB capacity. The main advantages of DAS is that it is high-performance, simpler to setup and configure, and typically lower-cost when compared to SAN storage. Snapshots do not replace a long term offsite backup solution, but they're great for short term very quick and convenient backups and restores. It then goes into ... Channel roadmap, 10Gb Ethernet, and Fibre Channel over Ethernet . • DAS offers highest performance among the three as it interfacesdirectly with storage. It increases performance and reliability with features like RAID and swappable drives designed for higher multi-drive workloads. While hard drives will always be the most common choice when it comes to storage, you may find that you could be restricted with their use – as such devices are often limited … While this analysis is related to the advantages of SAN but in order to make it complete and “fair”, let us also go over reasons for not using a SAN as well. B… NAS storage is also a good solution for consolidating storage systems from DAS – plus, having one centralized, shared storage system will save money in the long run, eliminate confusion and increase reliability in case of system failure or an outage. From this abstraction comes one of NAS’ biggest advantages: simplicity. It is stressful when one has to keep emailing a certain document in order … Instead of blocks, data lives in volumes that are made up of files and folders. The ability to shrink volumes to reclaim over-allocated space is a pretty big benefit. When using SAN as a storage protocol, you really can only grow those LUNs. Let us know, Goodbye 2020! Because the NAS server handles the file system, data is completely independent of the devices to which they are connected. Information technology has helped us become more effective and efficient in every aspect of day-to-day work. Want the complete course? The server will be using a server operating system such as Windows Server or Mac OS X Server. What are the advantages of SAN over NAS? With thin provisioning, I buy only the 2TB of storage that will be used now, but I make it look to the servers as if they actually have the full 500GB each. A server can fill a number of different roles, all of which manage resources and clients on the network. A big one, yes, but it will save you money in the long run. One of the biggest advantages of using a storage area network is that SANs generally provide better performance than competing technologies, such as NAS. We have one centralised pool of storage, and we can slice it up and distribute it to the different servers exactly how we want to and easily change it on the fly. Choose what works best for your data—that’s what NetApp is all about. We can also load balance incoming client requests for read-only data between the different sites. Becky Elliott is a Consulting Engineer at IronBrick. This gives additional storage efficiency. SAN and NAS each have their own benefits and trade-offs. Network Attached Storage (NAS) It is a special purpose device. They don't even have to have a single disk drive in the servers themselves. Like most IT questions on which approach to take when selecting a storage protocol to use, the answer is, “It depends.” Fortunately, it’s not an either-or question. In fact, according to Gartner, NAS purchases grew 12.6 percent year-over … A SAN will speed up your entire environment, give you a disaster recovery solution, and lengthen the life of your hardware, all while meeting your storage needs. For instance, if you serve your SAN data using Fibre Channel Protocol, you have Fibre Channel switches and HBAs (host-based adapters) dedicated for this traffic. (We can't do this for writable data as we need to maintain one consistent copy of the data). NetApp doesn’t limit you to using only SAN or only NAS. These CNAs offer improved performance. I've got multiple servers all using the same centralised storage, if there's any blocks on disk that are repeated, I can remove those duplicate blocks and just keep one copy. These two industry factors have led to a partial convergence of NAS and SAN approaches to network storage, effectively creating high-speed, high-capacity, and centrally located network devices. • The figure-1 depicts DAS network. Software such as VMware and Hyper-V allows us to run multiple virtual servers on the same underlying physical hardware server. Network-attached storage offers dedicated file serving and sharing through a network. A NAS is a single storage device that serves files over Ethernet and is relatively inexpensive and easy to set up, while a SAN is a tightly coupled network of multiple devices that work with block-based data and is more expensive and complex to set up and manage. She manages NetApp storage onsite for a government customer. But unlike with DAS, you get portability and a slew of other benefits from centralized management. SAN (Storage Area Network) is a block-level storage protocol, meaning data is stored and accessed in blocks. If you're using traditional direct attach storage, you'll maybe get utilisation of around 30%. Provision for effective disaster recovery processes. Have feedback for our website? From technical point of view, there isn’t any drawback. Faulty servers are easily and quickly replaced. Again this gives savings in hardware costs, rack space, power and cooling. Well if you're using DAS, you're not going to put in exactly 300GB of disk capacity in each of those servers, you're probably going to put in 500GB because you want to leave a bit of room for unexpected growth. Click here to get the Introduction to SAN and NAS Storage course for free. Network Attached Storage (NAS) is more abstracted than SAN storage. It is a block level storage system.It is building block for both NAS and SAN. 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