Broadcast Beat Magazine 2018 NAB Show Edition | Page 71
What if a NAS performed
as well as a SAN?
By André Kamps,
CEO, ELEMENTS
A tremendous boost in Ethernet performance
could outrun expensive Fibre Channel
The broad consensus in the post-production and
broadcast industry about the crucial importance
of high-performance media storage in every media
workflow ends rather abruptly when it comes to the
connectivity. The question “SAN or NAS?” is almost
religious, and supporters of each camp usually
advocate their respective opinions vehemently and
relentlessly.
However, latest developments may turn the tides,
and tip the scale in favor of the more cost-efficient
Ethernet topology – by adding lightning fast NVMe
storage.
The idea behind storage area networks (SAN), providing block-level
access instead of file-level access, is to segregate storage traffic
from the rest of the traffic in the network, aiming to increase both
efficiency and performance. While in a SAN all workstations share
the cumulative storage capacity, allowing for both the manage-
ability and the allocation of storage resources is easier and more
straightforward, SANs have a considerable downside though:
comparably high investment costs. A pure Fibre Channel set-up
requires pricey switches, and with only two noteworthy vendors of
Fibre Channel switches left in the market, there is hardly any price
competition. The amount of investment is often too high for smaller
post-production facilities or production islands.
Broadcast Beat Magazine • www.broadcastbeat.com • 71