In this session we will discuss the use of a company's own proprietary SAN storage vs using publicly-available cloud storage services such as AWS S3 and Rackspace. See http://aws.amazon.com or http://www.rackspace.com as examples. A storage area network (SAN) is a network which provides access to consolidated, block level data storage. SANs are primarily used to enhance storage devices, such as disk arrays, tape libraries, and optical jukeboxes, accessible to servers so that the devices appear to the operating system as locally attached devices. A SAN typically has its own network of storage devices that are generally not accessible through the local area network (LAN) by other devices. The cost and complexity of SANs dropped in the early 2000s to levels allowing wider adoption across both enterprise and small to medium-sized business environments.