NAS -(Network Attached Storage)
NAS Network Attached Storage is mostly similar to the DAS- Direct Attached Storage with the difference on the software inside it. Where NAS having its own OS-(Operating Systems) and its own softwares. While this software is a kind of managing software which can control managing the data storage, data access to the end users, and monitoring the functionalities of the storage components. NAS units normally have their own web interface for configuration and customization. Normal NAS systems have the storage containers with redundancy mode i.e basically we call as RAID(Redundant Arrays of Independent Disks). NAS systems performance mainly based upon the network traffic, and the memory caching capability of the box.
OS (Operating Systems):
NAS units have their customized OS operating systems which are fine tuned internally and nothing to do with the storage engineer. Its basically a simple box without complexions.
Software:
NAS systems have their own internal software which can be accessed through the web interface for configuration & management. Once the IP address gets configured it can be managed from the network also.
Protocols:
NFS, SMB (basically the file based protocols)
NFS- Network File System
SMB- Server Message Block
Advantages:
- End users can access the data through network easily.
- Easy configuration using web interface & support RAID 0,1,5
- Maximum performance can be achieved, since it doesn’t have any separate server to serve the data. So it doesn’t depends on the server performance like CPU, memory etc. It have CPU, RAM, motherboards in its own.
- With the redundancy on all the components (like redundancy in data path, controllers, power supplies) we can avoid single point of failures.
Disadvantages:
- When the concurrent sessions increases and attained the maximum CPU utilization with maximum I/O opearation level, then there will be the degradation in the performance.
- The RAM or the CPU cant be upgraded since its inbuilt within the NAS box.
Thanks,
Hariharan
