SQL Server using BlueArc NAS

Our company has been looking into BlueArc's Titan product which is
FiberChannel storage connected as NAS. They have many customers using SQL
Server with their Titan setup, but I am still skeptical of using NAS vs SAN
for SQL Server storage. BlueArc's solution is little different than typical
NAS since its completely hardware based where it has individual processors
for specific functions which speeds up communication over TCP/IP. The
internal fabric within the unit is running fiber channel.

The question I have is this... What are the fundamental reasons why Block
Level storage would be superior to File System type storage when dealing with
SQL Server? I realize that Fiber Channel has a 2Mbs pipe, but trunking
ethernet can also give you close to that. So if you can get close to
fiberchannel throughput with this NAS solution, are there other things that
would be an issue, specifically with the way SQL server operates on the
Storage/IO level?

Overall BlueArc has some attractive features that would work well with SQL
server, Snapshotting for backups and read only data, Accelerated Replication
for duplication for development purposes, FiberChannel Drives, Ability to
have Tier2 SATA on the same device (can be used to migrating archived data).

If anyone out there has heard of BlueArc or has any insight onto why NAS is
a bad idea please let me know.

BlueArc's Wesite: http://www.bluearc.com

.

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