For Immediate Release
February 20, 2002
For more information, a review copy, cover art, or an interview with
the author, contact:
Kathryn Barrett (707) 827-7094 or kathrynb@oreilly.com 



SANS OR NAS? O'REILLY AUTHOR SHEDS LIGHT ON 
THE SUBJECT OF STORAGE


Sebastopol, CA--Understanding the distinction between storage area
networks and network attached storage is a challenge at best,
unnecessarily exacerbated by the use of terms that are palindromes:
SANs and NAS. Added to the difficulty of remembering which technology
is which, network and storage administrators need to sort through the
comparative strengths and limitations of each technology to decide
which is appropriate for their network. In "Using SANs and NAS" 
(O'Reilly, US $29.95), author W. Curtis Preston distinguishes between 
the two technologies and provides the information that storage 
administrators will need, not only to make the right choices, but to 
actually build the data center that meets their requirements for size, 
speed, and reliability.

Modern data centers have extremely demanding requirements.
Multi-terabyte data stores are common and petabyte data stores are not
unheard of. Given these massive quantities of data, storage
administrators are challenged with ensuring that their data is always
available, that access times and throughput are reasonable, and that
the data can be backed up and restored in a timely manner. Storage area
networks, or SANs, and network attached storage, or NAS, are two
different approaches to solving these challenges. As Preston explains,
"Which storage architecture is appropriate for you depends heavily on
your environment. What is more important to you: cost, complexity,
flexibility, or raw throughput?"

"Using SANs and NAS" is a practical book that gives storage
administrators the tools and understanding they need to maximize their
investment in SANs or NAS, or a combination of the two. Beginning with
an overview of SAN and NAS architecture, the book covers the daily
management of SANs and NAS, with a special emphasis on backup and
recovery. A vendor-neutral approach makes the information applicable
for a wide range of administrators as they navigate the market of
competing SAN and NAS products.

"I wrote this book for several reasons," says Preston. "The first is
that I found a good bit of confusion in the industry as to what SANs
and NAS are. The second reason is that I've done a lot of really
interesting backup and recovery projects with both of them and wanted
to share the experience with everyone." Preston has specialized in
designing backup and recovery systems for more than eight years and has
designed such systems for many environments, both large and small.

Whether readers are seasoned storage administrators or network
administrators charged with taking on this role, they will find all the
information they need to make informed architecture and data management
decisions. "Using SANs and NAS" also covers technologies such as RAID
and other forms of monitoring that complement the data center. And,
with an eye on the future, the author explores other technologies, such
as iSCSI and DAFs, that might affect the architecture and management of
the data center. This is sure to be an essential volume in any network
administrator's or storage administrator's library.

Additional Resources:  "Using SANs and NAS" is also available on Safari
Books Online, see:  http://safari.oreilly.com/

Chapter 4, "SAN Backup and Recovery" is available free online at:
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/sansnas/chapter/ch04.html

For more information about the book, including Table of Contents, index, 
author bio, and samples, see:
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/sansnas/ 

For a cover graphic in jpeg format, go to:
ftp://ftp.ora.com/pub/graphics/book_covers/hi-res/0596001533.jpg


Using SANs and NAS
By W. Curtis Preston
ISBN 0-596-00153-3, 205 pages, $29.95 (US), $44.95 (CAN)
order@oreilly.com
1-800-998-9938
http://www.oreilly.com

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