SATA SSDs

Why an enterprise SATA SSD

An enterprise SATA SSD keeps the SATA interface every server controller accepts and adds the protections servers need from flash. Samsung lists power-loss protection and an endurance of 1.0 DWPD over a five-year limited warranty for one of its data-center SATA drives, and rates a higher-endurance data-center SATA model at 3 DWPD over five years. Proxmox recommends power-loss protection on SSDs for good performance and discourages consumer models.

SATA SSD or SAS SSD

A SATA SSD fits SATA-only bays and controllers as well as SAS ones, while a SAS SSD needs a SAS backplane and controller; Seagate's guidance is that SATA drives can go on SAS controllers but not the reverse. Within a RAID volume, keep to one interface; Dell's PERC 11 documentation does not allow a virtual disk to combine SATA and SAS drives.

The interfaces also queue work differently: SATA native command queuing holds up to 32 outstanding commands, where NVMe allows up to 64K queues of up to 64K commands each, per Intel and Seagate's NCQ paper and Seagate's NVMe primer.

SATA boot drives

For a dedicated boot device, Dell's BOSS-S1 and BOSS-S2 cards take 80 mm M.2 SATA SSDs; see M.2 SSDs and BOSS controller cards. How to pick an endurance class is covered in our guides to choosing between read-intensive, mixed-use and write-intensive drives and DWPD and TBW explained; servers built for Proxmox are covered in our Proxmox hardware guide, and every interface is on server SSDs, sizes such as 960GB and 1.92TB included.

Enterprise SATA SSD questions

Are enterprise SATA SSDs worth it over consumer SATA SSDs?

In a server, yes. Enterprise SATA drives document the protections a server relies on: Samsung lists power-loss protection and a 1.0 DWPD endurance rating over a five-year limited warranty on one of its data-center SATA SSDs. Proxmox's own guidance points the same way, toward PLP and away from consumer SSDs, and the enterprise models come in the 2.5-inch and M.2 forms server bays and boot cards take.

SATA SSD or SAS SSD for a server?

Use SATA where the server has SATA bays, a SATA-only controller or a boot card, since SATA drives also run behind SAS controllers. Choose SAS where the backplane and controller are SAS and the workload benefits from a second port or higher write endurance; Seagate's 12Gb/s SAS SSDs reach 10 DWPD. Never mix the two in one PERC 11 virtual disk.