Is shared serial-attached SCSI more affordable than a SAN?
In general, yes, it should be cheaper. However, it is limited in distance. But most servers today come with SAS on the motherboard, so there is the potential that you won’t need a SAS adapter. Depending on the implementation, shared SAS storage from companies such as Dell, HP, IBM, Oracle/Sun and others has the potential to be more affordable than iSCSI at low-end, small environments. What are the drawbacks/limitations of shared serial attached SCSI? The biggest drawback is that your server either must support SAS or you need to purchase a SAS adapter. It’s like iSCSI, you either have that 1 Gigabit Ethernet NIC built in or you have to buy it. Other than that, the biggest drawback is concerning distance. If you are looking to build out within tens of meters within your data center, you ought to be looking at something else. If you are looking to network within a cabinet or between two adjacent cabinets, shared SAS could be a candidate. Likewise, if you are looking to support 10, 20, 30
