Disk connection architectures

Data ONTAP supports two disk connection architectures: Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop (FC-AL) and Serial Attached SCSI (SAS).

FC and ATA disks use the FC-AL disk connection architecture. SAS and SATA disks use the SAS disk connection architecture.

• Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop (FC-AL) disk connection architecture
  For the FC-AL disk connection architecture, disk shelves are connected to the controller in a loop.
• Serial attached SCSI (SAS) disk connection architecture
  The SAS disk connection architecture is a point-to-point architecture. This means that the controller can communicate with more than one device at once.