SMB vs FTP

Server Message Block(SMB), one version of which was also known as Common Internet File System (CIFS) is a protocol for sharing files, printers, serial ports, and miscellaneous communications between nodes on a network.

File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a standard network protocol used for the transfer of computer files between a client and server on a computer network. FTP is built on a client-server model 

Though both are file sharing, application layer protocols here are few differences between them-

• SMB is a "real" file sharing tool but it relies on a "virtual network" implementation that makes it impossible to limit it's functionality on the TCP/IP level.
• SMB is firewall-unfriendly. It's also more or less limited to the windows platform only. (For UNIX systems Samba is available.)
• SMB uses a LOT of short messages which makes it VERY sensible to network latency.
• FTP’s main advantage is that since it's so OLD and UNIVERSAL,you can find the servers and clients for virtually all platforms and they communicate to one another without too much difficulty.
• FTP can be extremely fast to transfer large documents (though it's way less efficient with small files).FTP is faster than SMB but it has less functionality.
• FTP clients also have the option to split files into parts to do multi-part transfers which accelerate the speed even further for single file transfers, and this can be used in conjunction with multiple simultaneous file transfers.
• FTP clients main disadvantage is that “usernames, passwords and files are sent in clear text.”