HotHardware reviews Seagate Barracuda ES.2 1TB SAS hard drive
Let's talk about SCSI for a moment. The disk interface which was once ubiquitous with high-end workstations and servers is now on the verge of obsolescence. With the influx of inexpensive and reliable Serial ATA hard disks and hardware SATA RAID controllers (which can provide excellent performance at a fraction of a SCSI's price), it's not surprising to see why legacy SCSI doesn't even enter the mind of enterprise server and workstation platform buyers, even those diehards of the past.
However, like PATA's evolution to SATA, SCSI has also gone the way of serial connectivity and it still holds its advantages. For example, 15K RPM hard disks are only available with a SCSI or SAS (Serial Attached SCSI) interface, and true hardware SAS RAID cards, when paired with 15,000 RPM disks, can deliver performance that SATA setups simply can't deliver at this point in time. Not to mention the additional diagnostic, error reporting and recovery capabilities of SAS in a RAID set, that you just can't get in the event of a drive failure in a SATA RAID set. However, the price per gigabyte versus the performance that SAS offers over SATA simply hasn't worked out in favor of SAS, and as such, the standard has been struggling to stay relevant. This is evident in the new generation of solid state hard drives (SSDs) being offered with SATA interfaces and not a hint of SAS SSD offerings on the horizon.
That said SAS solution providers seem to be reacting, as the barriers to entry for SAS versus SATA have been fading away as of late. SAS controller cards can be had for a little as $70, and SAS hard drives are dropping in price, though historically capacities have trailed SATA by a long shot. Also, some new motherboards offerings are being equipped with onboard SAS controllers as well...
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