Originally Posted by robwod

SAS Drives are faster as well -- typical SATA drive speeds are still 7200RPM whereas SAS drives are usually offered in the 10,000 to 15,000 RPM range. However, these drives are typically more expensive as well.

Whatever you go with, make sure your web host provider is using Enterprise grade hardware and not consumer grade.

Your decision to go with either type of drive, or even SSD drives, will be influenced by the tasks you expect the server to perform efficiently. Example: do you need to perform heavy SQL processing, a lot of php processing, dynamic page delivery, video streaming, how much traffic you get, do you just need a lot of basic storage, etc. There are a lot of variables.