In general, NAS is storage in a form that is readily accessible on a network, as opposed to direct-attached storage. Traditionally this meant having a storage array device that incorporated a file system and presented either a networked file system protocol such as NFS or CIFS, or else emulated a disk device so that the array could be connected to a storage I/O interconnect to the host.
This is a device that contains a number of disk units attached to a dedicated server. The NAS device appears as a server on the network. It is possible to communicate with it using standard file sharing protocols, therefore no specialised hardware is required. See Storage Area Network (SAN).
A specialized file server that connects to a network. LiveVault Online Backup Service uses a NAS device for restoring large amounts of data in your network. It is a stand-alone unit that plugs into an Ethernet port and includes the file sharing protocols necessary to have the device recognized as a share on the network. A Snap Server is a type of NAS device. See also CD-ROM, media, Snap Server.
Hard disk storage that provides shared data to clients and servers on a LAN. NAS has separate network address from the LAN computer that serves applications to users. This setup allow application programs and files to be served faster because they rely on different processor resources.
A high-performance storage server individually connected to a network to provide storage for computers on that network.
A storage design that connects a server to externally enclosed hard drives via a local area network.
The use of specialized devices that function simply as hard drives connected to a network. NAS devices typically consist of one or more hard drives in...