Editing Windows Server 2003 (section)

====Features====
* '''[[Distributed File System (Microsoft)|Distributed File System]] (DFS)''': Allows multiple [[network share]]s to be aggregated as a virtual file system.
* Support for '''[[Storage area network|SAN]]''' and '''[[iSCSI]]''': Allows computers to connect to a Storage Server over the [[LAN]], without the need for a separate [[fibre channel]] network, thus a [[Storage Area Network]] can be created over the [[LAN]] itself. iSCSI uses the [[SCSI]] protocol to transfer data as a block of bytes, rather than as a file. This increases performance of the Storage network in some scenarios, such as using a database server.
* '''Virtual Disc Service''': Allows [[Network-attached storage|NAS]] devices, [[RAID]] devices and SAN shares to be exposed and managed as if they were normal hard drives.
* '''JBOD systems''': [[JBOD]] (''Just a bunch of discs'') systems, by using VDS, can manage a group of individual storage devices as a single unit. There is no need for the storage units to be of the same maker and model.
* Software and Hardware '''RAID''': Windows Storage Server 2003 has intrinsic support for hardware implementation of [[RAID]]. In case hardware support is not available, it can use software enabled RAID. In that case, all processing is done by the OS.
* '''Multi Path IO (MPIO)''': It provides an alternate connection to IO devices in case the primary path is down.