If you're a regular reader of STA's Serial Storage Wire, you know that there's a transition taking place in the storage industry from FC-AL to Serial-Attached SCSI (SAS) storage architectures and disk drives... NetApp is well into this technology transition, where SAS-connected disk shelves now account for a majority of storage shipped with new NetApp® systems.
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Articles
Contributed article to InterConnection World by Jay Neer, Molex
The initial release for Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) connectors and cables was a bit different from the typical release of a new I/O standard. The SCSI Trade Association (STA) was committed to enabling Serial ATA (SATA) connectivity with SAS, so close coordination was required between the two standards organizations to achieve this goal. The idea was to create one-way interconnectivity to permit SATA hard-disk drives (HDDs) to plug into SAS backplanes, while preventing the dual-port SAS HDDs from plugging into SATA backplanes.
Presentations
SAS Preservation & Innovation FOSE-SAS-Storage-Performance-V3-web.pdf
Presenters: Harry Mason, President, SCSI Trade Association
Marty Czekalski, Vice President, SCSI Trade Association
Where: Storage Networking World Fall 2011, Orlando, FL
When: October 12, 2011
In this presentation Mason and Czekalski present:
- Update on the SCSI Trade Association
- Range of SAS & SATA storage solutions
- SAS technology and market overview
- Key markets and sample deployments
- Extending SAS innovation
- 12Gb/s
- MultiLink SAS™
- Advanced Connectivity
Presenters: Harry Mason, President SCSI Trade Association, and Director of Industry Marketing at LSI, Corp.
Marty Czekalski, Vice President SCSI Trade Association, and Interface & Emerging Architecture
Program Manager at Seagate
Where: Storage Developers Conference, Santa Clara, CA
When: September 19, 2011
In this presentation Mason and Czekalski provide:
- SAS Overview
- SAS Performance Roadmap and 12Gb/s SAS staging
- MultiLink SAS™ and Advanced Connectivity
- SCSI over PCIe (SOP)
- Backplane Receptacle Compatibility
Extending SAS innovation:
- 12Gb/s SAS
- MultiLink SAS™
- Advanced Connectivity
Presenters from Molex: Galen Fromm, Senior Electrical Project Engineer, Jay Neer, Strategic Product Manager, and Edmund Poh, Senior Product Engineer
Where: Flash Memory Summit
When: August 9 - 11, 2011
Fromm, Near and Poh present a snapshot and status report on Serial Attached SCSI and the development of connectors for enterprise storage bays.
By: Harry Mason, President SCSI Trade Association, Director of Marketing, LSI
Where: FOSE Conference & Exhibition, Washington, DC
When: July 11 - 14, 2011
Mason presents an overview of the SCSI Trade Association, SAS technology and the market for SAS products and technology, including key markets, sample deployments and what SAS innovations will present in the future.
- Ultra320 SCSI gave way to 3Gb/s SAS (2005-06)
- 6Gb/s SAS was announced in 4Q08
- 6Gb/s SAS systems now shipping with full scale deployment expected 4Q09-1Q10.
- 6Gb/s SAS advances dramatically in external storage shipments
- Drive attach: significant penetration
- Host attach: steadily growing
Download presentation... (PDF)
White Papers
SCSI Trade Association White Paper
by: Harry Mason, Director, Industry Marketing, LSI Corp.,
With Contributions by Jay Neer, Advanced Technical Marketing Manager,
Industry Standards, Molex
Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) burst upon the storage scene in 2004 as a serial replacement for the once ubiquitous parallel SCSI interconnect. While much attention is often given to the capabilities of the protocol and to the silicon and software required to implement these systems, it is often the physical interconnections that influence the adoption of I/O in a variety of market segments. Parallel SCSI, for example, supported everything necessary for clustered server deployments; however, the large unwieldy nature of the parallel cables and the restricted cabling distances greatly limited SCSI's applicability in these markets.
Download white paper (PDF)Press Releases
Enterprise SAS/Fibre Channel SSD Leader Produces the Industry's Highest Performance SAS SSDs for Demanding Financial and Online Transaction Processing, Cloud Computing and Big Data Environments
Industry-leading, 2.5-inch, 12Gb/s SAS SSD family includes:
- High Endurance Ultrastar™ SSD800MH - sequential throughput of up to 1,200MB/s read and 750MB/s write; up to 145,000 read and 100,000 sustained write IOPS; up to 800GB; and the highest endurance rating at 25 full drive writes per day (DW/D) to support high-frequency trading and online transaction processing.
- Mainstream Endurance Ultrastar SSD800MM - sequential throughput of up to 1,200MB/s read and 700MB/s write; up to 145,000 read and 70,000 sustained write IOPS; up to 800GB; and a high endurance rating at 10 full DW/D to support online gaming, big data and cloud computing.
- Read Intensive Ultrastar SSD1000MR - sequential throughput of up to 1,200MB/s read and 700MB/s write; up to 145,000 read and 20,000 sustained write IOPS; up to 1,000GB (1TB); and an endurance rating at two full DW/D to support online audio/video streaming, cloud computing and other Internet applications.
SAN JOSE, Calif., April 9, 2013 - HGST (formerly Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and now a Western Digital company, NASDAQ: WDC) today announced the industry's fastest and most advanced enterprise-class, multi level cell (MLC) SAS SSD family - the Ultrastar SSD800MH, Ultrastar SSD800MM and Ultrastar SSD1000MR. From the market share leader in enterprise SAS/FC SSDs, these HGST drives are the first to double today's SAS interface speed. Designed for the most demanding applications where "hot" data is accessed frequently, such as high-frequency trading, online banking, cloud computing, online gaming, and big data analytics, HGST's new 12Gb/s SAS SSDs help increase input/output per second (IOPS) and improve response times to mission-critical data in cloud and traditional IT datacenters environments.
SAS is a proven platform for innovation and offers superior enterprise-class system performance, reliability, connectivity and scalability
SAN FRANCISCO - March 25, 2013 — In a digital world where data can quickly become "business critical" for server and data storage OEMs, system builders and end-users, the SCSI Trade Association (STA) today announced two important developments in the advancement of the 12Gb/s Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) storage interface. SAS is a proven storage interface based on the SCSI protocol that has the stability to tackle the most critical storage demands, without unnecessary complexities and integration challenges.
12Gb/s SAS RAID-on-Chip and I/O controllers deliver performance required for next-generation server and external storage platforms
CEBIT, HANNOVER, GERMANY, March 5, 2013 — LSI Corporation (NASDAQ: LSI) today announced the company is first to ship production-level 12Gb/s SAS RAID-on-Chip (ROC) and I/O controller solutions to OEM customers. 12Gb/s SAS technology is designed to deliver double the data transfer rate of prior SAS solutions and unleashes the full performance potential of next-generation enterprise systems deploying high-performance solid-state storage.
Continue reading LSI First to Ship New High-Performance 12Gb/s SAS Products.
12Gb/s SAS products expected in production volumes in 2013 along with advancement of SCSI Express technology
SAN FRANCISCO - February 5, 2013 — The SCSI Trade Association (STA) (http://www.scsita.org/), a member-run industry association established to support and promote SCSI technology, today announced its newly elected Board of Directors for 2013. After appointments to the board were made in July 2012 due to job changes and a retirement, the entire board roster was reelected.
Continue reading SCSI Trade Association Announces 2013 Board of Directors.
Physical level testing of 12 Gb/s SAS technology unveils the ability of this higher performance storage interface to speed access to data in critical applications
SAN FRANCISCO - September 5, 2012 -- With a focus on the emerging 12 Gb/s SAS storage interface that provides a roadmap to higher performance, the SCSI Trade Association (STA) today announced the successful completion of the13th Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) Plugfest held August 20-24, 2012, at the University of New Hampshire InterOperability Laboratory (UNH-IOL). STA is a member-run industry association established to support and promote SCSI technology. Twenty-one companies, including both STA members and non-members, participated in the Plugfest event.
Doubles I/O storage performance and alleviates bottlenecks to help manage explosive data demands for cloud and enterprise datacenters
MILPITAS, Calif., July 17, 2012 - LSI Corporation (NYSE: LSI) today announced that its 12Gb/s SAS technology has been selected by Xyratex to power its next-generation storage systems. Xyratex will include the LSI® 12Gb/s I/O controller and expander, featuring DataBolt™ technology, to provide customers with leading-edge solutions to handle the scale and performance requirements brought on by rapidly growing storage demands.
Protocol Analysis for 12Gb/s Serial Attached SCSI (SAS)
STA Technology Showcase, Santa Clara, CA, May 9, 2012 - LeCroy Corporation, the worldwide leader in protocol test solutions, today announced the addition of the Sierra M124 12Gb/s Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) Protocol Analyzer platform to its leading Sierra protocol analyzer line of products; supporting protocol testing and debugging of all 12Gb/s SAS and legacy SAS storage interfaces. Previously, LeCroy has provided the Storage industry with the broadest range of test capabilities in the SCSI protocol test market. Now, along with today's announcement of the Summit PCIe protocol analyzer line's support of SCSI Express, LeCroy is also extending this commitment to the next generation of SAS.
Continue reading LeCroy Announces New 12Gb/s SAS Protocol Analyzer.
Achieve improved performance benefits of 12Gb/s SAS with existing 6Gb/s drive infrastructure
LSI to demonstrate DataBolt technology, together with Xyratex, at the SCSI Trade Association Technology Showcase
MILPITAS, Calif., May 8, 2012 - LSI Corporation (NYSE: LSI) today announced DataBolt™ bandwidth optimizer technology, a unique performance acceleration feature for LSI® 12Gb/s SAS solutions designed to allow users to take advantage of 12Gb/s speeds while using existing 6Gb/s drive infrastructure.
Continue reading LSI Announces DataBolt™ Technology to Accelerate Datacenter Performance.
Industry Storage Event Highlights PMC Products in Key SAS Demonstrations
SUNNYVALE, Calif., May 8, 2012 - PMC® (Nasdaq:PMCS), the semiconductor innovator transforming storage, optical and mobile networks, today announced its participation and sponsorship of the SCSI Trade Association (STA) Technology Showcase. PMC will demonstrate its industry leading 12Gb/s SAS, 6Gb/s SAS and SSD caching products at this event for customers, industry analysts, editors and partners.
Technical milestones at conference to help pave the way for commercial deployment
Cupertino, Calif. -- May 7, 2012 -- Seagate (NASDAQ:STX) will demonstrate a variety of technologies at the SCSI Trade Association (STA) Technology Showcase this week aimed at improving the performance of servers, datacenters and cloud computing applications, including the first public demonstration of solid-state drives operating at 12 gigabits per second.
Doubling Today's Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) Speed, 12Gb/s SAS SSDs and HDDs will be the Drives of Choice for Future Generations of High-Performance Enterprise Servers and Storage Solutions;
HGST is Participating in the SCSI Trade Association Technology Showcase on May 9, 2012
SAN JOSE, Calif., May 1, 2012 - HGST (formerly Hitachi Global Storage Technologies and now a Western Digital company, NYSE: WDC) today announced the storage industry's first technology demonstration of a 12 gigabit per second (12Gb/s) SAS solid state drive (SSD), representing the next performance step in the evolution of SAS, the preferred interface technology for enterprise servers and storage solutions. HGST is participating in the 12Gb/s SAS demonstration at the SCSI Trade Association Technology Showcase on May 9, 2012, at the Hyatt Hotel in Santa Clara, Calif.
Continue reading HGST DEMONSTRATES INDUSTRY'S FIRST 12Gb/s SAS SSD.
Controllers Deliver Greater than Two Million IOPS and Expanders Provide 68 Ports of SAS Connectivity to Enable Mainstream SSD Deployment
SUNNYVALE, Calif., January 31, 2012 - PMC-Sierra, Inc., (Nasdaq:PMCS) or PMC, the semiconductor innovator transforming storage, optical and mobile networks, today announced availability of its 12Gb/s SAS protocol controllers, RAID-on-Chip (RoC) controllers and expanders to enable breakthrough performance and scalability for server and networked storage. High-performance solid state drives (SSDs) can deliver up to 100 times more I/Os per second (IOPS) than traditional hard disk drives (HDDs), creating the need for a new class of storage controller. PMC's 12Gb/s SAS controllers are optimized for performance to solve this need and release the full potential of SSDs. With the addition of the industry's highest port count expanders, PMC's 12Gb/s solution delivers 40 percent more drive connectivity than competitive solutions, enabling a new generation of scalable tiered storage for corporate and cloud data centers.
Technology demonstration to highlight significant performance benefits of 12Gb/s SAS with existing 6Gb/s drive infrastructure
ACCELERATING INNOVATION SUMMIT, MILPITAS, Calif., November 15, 2011 — LSI Corporation (NYSE: LSI) today announced it is demonstrating the industry's first 12Gb/s SAS expander IC this week at the LSI Accelerating Innovation Summit and Technology Showcase in Milpitas, Calif.
Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) remains the proven platform for storage innovation and the gold standard for enterprise computing
SAN FRANCISCO - November 9, 2011 — Creating significant news for data storage OEMs, system builders and end-users who are seeking fast, flexible and reliable data access, the SCSI Trade Association (STA) (http://www.scsita.org/) today announced the definition and standardization phase of 12Gb/s Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) technology is progressing as anticipated. STA, a non-profit industry association established to support and promote SCSI technology, also noted that the development and testing of components such as cables, connectors, protocol analyzers and controllers based on this new generation of SAS for storage solutions has begun in earnest.
STA looks to the future as SSD devices and dynamic zoning gain in popularity and new features such as 12Gb/s SAS and optical connections begin to unveil themselves
SAN FRANCISCO - October 4, 2011 — The SCSI Trade Association (STA) (http://www.scsita.org/), a member-run industry association established to support and promote SCSI technology, announced today that the 12th Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) Plugfest was held September 19-23, 2011, at the University of New Hampshire InterOperability Laboratory (UNH-IOL). Sixteen companies, including both STA members and non-members, attended the event.
LSI® SAS ROC delivers I/O performance levels needed to unlock the full potential of flash storage and forthcoming PCI Express 3.0-based server platforms
INTEL DEVELOPER FORUM, San Francisco, Calif., September 13, 2011 — LSI Corporation (NYSE: LSI) today announced it is demonstrating its next-generation 12Gb/s SAS RAID-on-Chip (ROC) technology this week, September 13-15, at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in San Francisco.
The IDF demonstration showcases a single 8-port 12Gb/s SAS ROC IC achieving over 1.2 million IOPS (I/O operations per second) running small block sequential reads/writes in a PCI Express® 2.0 direct-attached storage configuration connected to eight 6Gb/s Seagate® SAS 2.5-inch hard disk drives.
Technology demonstrations for OEM customers break the million IOPS performance barrier with a single 8-port RAID-on-Chip ICM
MILPITAS, Calif., July 25, 2011 - LSI Corporation (NYSE: LSI) today announced the industry's first sample shipments of 12Gb/s SAS RAID-on-Chip (ROC), controller and expander ICs to server and external storage OEMs, underscoring LSI® leadership in the SAS market segment. By providing customers with early samples of 12Gb/s SAS silicon, LSI is delivering a key technology milestone and laying the foundation for the anticipated SCSI Trade Association 12Gb/s SAS Plugfest in mid-2012.
