The Hewlett-Packard Fiber Channel Adapter is a reliable, high performance serial I/O storage interface for servers. The serial nature of Fiber Channel brings the flexibility and ease of use of LAN connectivity to storage attachment, introducing the idea of Storage Area Networks (SAN). Fiber Channel simplifies the physical configuration issues related to the I/O channel. Peripherals may be positioned at considerable distances from the server (depending on cabling media) for convenience or for data security. More reliable in data transfer than conventional LAN, Fiber Channel offers Gigabit performance and greater device connectivity than parallel SCSI. The HP Fiber Channel Adapter provides the I/O channel scalability required for continuous growth in storage capacity and availability needs.