Watch out Fibre Channel: 12 gig SAS has arrived

Xyratex is plotting to build a drive array with doubled SAS interface speed using LSI 12Gbit/s SAS gear. SAS – or Serial-Attached SCSI (Small Computer System Interface) – is a way of linking storage media and controllers/servers that is enterprise class but without the complexities of Fibre Channel. First generation SAS runs …

[Alan Brown]

Even without 12Gb/s drives

This is good for dealing with saturation of SAS-X4 links between arrays.

[ScissorHands]

What complexity?

FC can be point-to-point or switched.

SAS can be point-to-point only.

Less complexity, huge difference in capabilities. But in fact, nobody uses FC for point-to-point any more. There's no point [/coat].

Wake me up when someone develops a SAS fabric (SAS over E-Pcie does not count).

[O RLY]

Here's a wakeup call

Hewlett-Packard have been OEMing the LSI technology shown here for a few years now.

http://www.lsi.com/channel/products/storagecomponents/Pages/LSISAS6160Switch.aspx

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Here's a wakeup call

Half the industry OEM LSI's3Gb/s and 6Gb/s - 12Gb/s is very new.

The 12G chipset was only released a few months ago so I think you are misunderstanding what the discussion is about.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: What complexity?

Umm - google "sas switch". A whole range of switches and switched sas fabrics are available.

[Steven Jones]

FC competitor?

SAS is OK for simple systems, but it's no competitor to FC for large, enterprise computer centres. It simply lacks the connectivity, flexibility and switching capability.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: FC competitor?

Agreed. If there is any competitor that FC should look out for, it's Infiniband, not SAS.

[Morg]

Re: FC competitor?

or plain old Ethernet. as it's standard it tends to be cheaper, and currently you can easily and cheaply use 40gbe.

[Alan Brown]

Not to mention distance

I have FC running between buildings. SAS won't match that anytime soon.

That said, 12GB/s is _still_ useful connecting array controllers to JBODS.

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh?

FC is already up to at least 16Gb/s now, so it's still ahead of 12Gb/s SAS. That and most HBAs are dual-port, so double that speed.

IB is interesting (when it works!), but there isn't a whole lot of top tier IB storage vendors. Sure, there are bottom-tier vendors that'll sell you an IB NAS, but IB SAN is almost impossible find. Most of it is ZFS based exporting ZVOLs or Linux machines exporting block devices.