IT Pro Verdict
The affordable ExaSAN A16S3-PS beats Thunderbolt 2 hands down for performance making it a top candidate for 4K video editing.
Pros
- +
Excellent performer; Innovative PCIe 3.0 connectivity; Good value; HBA and QSFP cable included
Cons
- -
Snapshot synchronisation is very slow
Many storage vendors would have you believe that Thunderbolt is the only way forward for high performance storage and video editing but Accusys has a more compelling alternative. Its main focus has been on developing an end-to-end PCIe 3.0 storage solution and its latest ExaSAN A16S3-PS claims Thunderbolt-busting read speeds of 2,500MB/sec.
The A16S3-PS is a well-built 3U 16-bay storage array that supports SAS and SATA hard disks fitted in very solid hot-swap carriers. It has a single RAID sled at the rear equipped with an LSI SAS3108 controller teamed up with 2GB of ECC DDR3 cache.
The smart part comes with the interface design as the controller has a QSFP (quad small form-factor pluggable) port for direct connection to the host system. This provides four 8Gb/sec PCIe 3.0 lanes for a total bandwidth of 32Gb/sec.
The kit comes complete with a dual-port HBA and copper cable but much longer optical cables are available
