Another service offered by OPS is access to ITS' Storage Area Network (SAN). This environment removes the hard drives from the servers themselves and places them in a spearate device. Advantages of this type of architecture are the ability to allow growth in storage without having to replace or augment a server when the storage capacity exceeds the limits of the server's hardware. This reduces server administration overhead.

This service could be beneficial for departments with large and growing storage needs served by a few applications (e.g. Programs requiring large or many data files or databases).

Cost for this service is dependent on the implementation. This solution also requires server comaptiblity with the SAN (e.g. does not support the Mac platform) and a close working relationshiip between ITS support staff and departmental administrators.