Why SAS and SATA are so attractive to users and resellers

NETWORK WORLD NEWSLETTER: MIKE KARP ON STORAGE IN THE ENTERPRISE
09/22/05
Today's focus: Why SAS and SATA are so attractive to users and
resellers

Dear networking.world@gmail.com,

In this issue:

* What are the benefits of serial-attached SCSI and serial ATA?
* Links related to Storage in the Enterprise
* Featured reader resource
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Today's focus: Why SAS and SATA are so attractive to users and
resellers

By Mike Karp

Serial-attached SCSI, serial ATA and the storage reseller
community are all going to be great friends. I was at a meeting
last week in Chicago when storage distributor Bell Micro
introduced vendors that have been developing the industry's new
serial I/O technologies to a number of Midwestern resellers.

Resellers like road shows of this sort because they pull a lot
of information into one place at one time - the resellers can
talk to the vendors, gather plenty of information in a single
day, and then get back to doing business. The vendors like these
things because they get a number of potential customers in one
room at the same time.

Resellers of course come in many different varieties - some
resell equipment from the major vendors, adding value of their
own in any of a number of ways. The folks at the Chicago meeting
were resellers of a different type however - they were the ones
that build the "white boxes" we often hear about, typically
unbranded machines that often use components identical to those
appearing in the "branded" machines that the major vendors
build. Customers go to such resellers for any of several
reasons, but most often because they feel they can't get enough
visibility with the larger vendors, or because they see a
reseller as providing some particular added value - software and
hardware bundles, perhaps - that makes life easier for them. And
sometimes customers go to resellers because these smaller system
builders just plain provide them with a better level of service
that is more closely aligned with their needs.

With SATA and SAS, resellers will be building systems that move
data on and off disks at twice the speed of the previous
generation of machines that used parallel I/O. Also, while the
price difference between SATA and the parallel ATA it replaces
is about 15% right now, expect this delta to disappear as soon
as sales of SATA drives overtake parallel ATA sales, probably in
about a year's time. The pricing difference between SAS and
parallel SCSI should already be about zero.

It is important to keep in mind that as far as system builders
are concerned, serial I/O is about more than just faster I/O for
the same price. It is also about synergies and the business
advantage that they can create.

These new serial devices - SATA for basic capability and SAS for
high-end, performance-driven applications - offer system
builders complementary storage technologies that work together
well and which offer a chance for a reseller to get double value
out of development efforts. Keep in mind that a SAS backplane
accommodates both SAS and SATA devices, and that one box, in a
manner of speaking, yields two different products.

Add to this another, important point - design simplicity. First,
serial devices can be simpler because they allow easier airflow
within machines. Second, device timing is much easier because
timing is coordinated with a single serial signal and not with
multiple parallel signals. The result: simpler designs that are
easier to build.

This sort of thing is important for those resellers interested
in margins, which by my estimate encompasses about all of them.
When a technology investment can be leveraged across multiple
storage products, the opportunity for improved margins arises.

Just as importantly, the people who will buy these devices also
get a more flexible storage environment. They can buy a device
with SAS drives for instance, and then remove the original
storage for use elsewhere and repopulate the box with SATA
drives. Alternatively, they can add another storage module and
have one bay with SATA and another with SAS, offering them
tiered storage in the same device.

One thing that may not be such a good idea however would be to
mix-and-match SATA and SAS devices in the same device bay.
Putting together untested combinations of devices would be fine
as far as I/O is concerned, but with the close proximity of all
the different drives, no one can know what the effect on
vibration might be. It is probably not worth taking the chance.

SAS and SATA give everyone a chance to build added economies
into the way systems are built. It is getting to the point where
anyone who can't understand that is likely to be a taco short of
a combination plate.

The top 5: Today's most-read stories

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3. Users discuss big VoIP rollout risks and rewards
<http://www.networkworld.com/nlstorage7510>

4. Cisco targets SMBs with convergence
<http://www.networkworld.com/nlstorage7511>

5. DemoFall preview <http://www.networkworld.com/nlstorage7335>

_______________________________________________________________
To contact: Mike Karp

Mike Karp is senior analyst with Enterprise Management
Associates, focusing on storage, storage management and the
methodology that brings these issues into the marketplace. He
has spent more than 20 years in storage, systems management and
telecommunications. Mike can be reached via e-mail
<mailto:mkarp@enterprisemanagement.com>.
_______________________________________________________________
This newsletter is sponsored by Ciena
Free White Paper: Best Practices in Storage-over-Distance
Implementation

Learn how the right storage extension implementation can enable
strategic competitive and cost advantages with high-performance,
low-cost data center connectivity--supporting virtually all
time-sensitive, mission-critical applications enterprise-wide.
Free white paper courtesy of Ciena.
http://www.fattail.com/redir/redirect.asp?CID=115404
_______________________________________________________________
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