The Cons Cost. Industry experts say a comprehensive SAN could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, putting them beyond the reach of most small enterprises. Although a SAN could yield savings through the need for fewer IT professionals, the upfront cost intimidates most companies. Some small and medium-size enterprises might want to build miniature SANs, consisting of a few switches on the network, for specific departments and applications. These smaller networks give you a head start and can be expanded later to accommodate your computing needs.
Interoperability also is a drawback.
Companies implementing a SAN often buy hardware from one company, software from another company, while a third company supplies the components needed to connect everything together. A lot of vendors make a single component, so companies need to be careful that the components they select are compatible with their system. The Storage Networking Industry Association of Mountain View, Calif., is promoting open standards to ensure that different vendors' storage networking product products work compatibly. But the association concedes open standards are at least a year or two away. The lack of industry standards also heightens concern about security and the ability to prevent unauthorized access to data.