EMC, IBM and less well-known storage specialists such as BlueArc are beginning to mix and match the best elements of network-attached storage (NAS) devices and storage area networks (SAN) to improve the efficiency and lower the cost of storing data.
NAS boxes, which hook into existing Ethernet networks, are simpler to manage than SANs, but provide less performance and can top out on capacity. SANs generally are far faster and hold more data, but they can be expensive and result in cumbersome file sharing.
The Law Enforcement Support Agency of Tacoma, Washington, for instance, which provides services such as records management to local law enforcement groups, opted for a 6-terabyte "SiliconServer" system from BlueArc that is on the surface a NAS product -- serving files over an Ethernet network -- but promises the speediness of a SAN.
"We have not suffered any performance degradation," said David Reinker, an information systems manager at the agency. "In some cases, we've found it to be slightly faster."
BlueArc SiliconServer products allow for a SAN-like capacity of up to 256 terabytes in a single cabinet.
On Monday, the company unveiled a new product called "Titan SiliconServer," which also combines elements of NAS devices and SAN. The product can expand to greater capacities and adds features including the ability to increase system speed over time.
One sign of the push to merge NAS and SAN is the growing popularity of so-called NAS gateways. These are devices without disks of their own that can connect SANs with Ethernet networks. Worldwide revenue for NAS gateway products jumped 27 percent last year to $84m (£46m), according to market research firm Gartner. Gartner expects annual NAS gateway revenue to grow 27 percent between 2002 and 2007, reaching $215m in 2007.
