Are SATA and mini-SAS Cables Same?

The question ‘Are SATA and mini-SAS cables the same?’ is somewhat esoteric, but it is worthy of an explanation, and perhaps if any of you reading this run into a SAS connector while supporting personal computer systems. Needless to say, you might not be into tech. And as modern computers are a very complicated piece of machinery, you might still get confused if you learn the whole concept. So let’s see the terms SATA and SAS in the most simplistic terms possible.

Basically, SATA and SAS are two technologies that computers use to transfer data from the motherboard to storage, and vice versa. While Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) technology has replaced the less expensive ATA drive but they have been upgrading their offerings as well. It has been a great replacement for the older Parallel Small Computer System Interface technology. On the other hand, Serial Advanced Technology Adapter (SATA) is a connection type that shares many characteristics with SAS and is used for a wide array of personal computing devices. It is an inexpensive alternative for situations where users don’t want to invest in expensive drives and probably get the work done. To integrate with the computer it just requires a simplified circuit that will identify the controller as being integrated.

Both the technologies do roughly the same thing, although each is built with different hardware, the connectors themselves are slightly different. 

Main Differences Between SATA and Mini-SAS Cables:

The Connectors

The SATA data cable is seven-pin which requires two connectors, one for data and one for power which terminates with an L-notched connector. When it comes to SAS cable connection it merges the power and data into a single edge connected cable.

Performance

Though the performance is going to be pretty much the same on both platforms in the near future. At present, SAS is a tough one if you don’t mind paying a slightly higher price. Typically, the most popular format or the speed at which the data platters rotate, for SAS it generally comes in two main types, that is 10k and 15k. Whereas for SATA drives it is 7.2K.

So to simply put, SAS drivers are faster and more reliable than the SATA cable connectors.

Integration With The Pace of Work

SATA cables are generally used in consumer-grade environments where the workload is less and SAS is used in a professional-grade environment as there is a constant need for reliability, availability, and serviceability along with features like speed and also the price. Before investing in either of the technologies, whether SATA or SAS, the differences should be carefully investigated.

Additional Features

SAS provides a number of benefits as opposed to the features provided by SATA. As a standard in SAS, it supports dual-porting support. That means if one of the ports goes down, there will be a second port available for the host and also eliminates the risk of a single point of failure. SAS can also be extended or used for redundant data paths or connections to multiple hosts with thousands of devices that can be easily implemented eliminating the risk of a single point of failure. But SATA is only limited to a few point-to-point connections off a motherboard. Though read after the write is added to a SATA system and possibly can correct errors. However, this can degrade the performance which is significant.

Reliability

SAS SSD delivers faster data transfer rates as compared to ATA or SATA SSD. In contrast to a SATA cable, mini-SAS is full-duplex and can be used to transfer in both directions and builds in features to improve reliability. It is used in professional environments because of features such as advanced error correction, multi-host environments serving different hosts connected to one channel, data integrity technology, and high signal quality on the cable. When it comes to SATA, it uses a single channel and there is the only half-duplex transmission. For this reason, SATA is too slow and can’t be utilized in environments where high-speed performance is required.

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Created on Sep 18th 2020 08:30. Viewed 1,275 times.

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