Using NPIV on a 9506 Director and 9148 switch

[RaveDave1]

I have a customer that is looking to purchase either a 9506 Directory with 48-port 8Gbps ports or 9148s.

He needs NPIV on some ports, and other ports that are non-NPIV.

The documentation for NPIV states that NPIV is enable on the 9148 for the whole switch or diabled for the whole switch.

Does this mean that when NPIV is enabled on a 9148 that only NPIV connections are supported, or something different?  Is it possible to have ports that are NPIV enabled for a VMware ESX server and another that is non-NPIV in the same 9148 chassis?  If not, how would you handle those ports requiring NPIV and those ports not needing NPIV.

Similar question for NPIV on a 9506 Director switch.  How does enabling NPIV affect the ports on the Director switch.  Can non-NPIV connections and NPIV connections be made to the same blade?

Thank-you for your time.

Dave

[dynamoxxx]

NPIV is enabled for the whole switch (regardless of the switch model). NPIV simply allows multiple f-logi on the same physical port, there is nothing you have to do on the switch side to control that. For example, here is a Cisco MDS 9124e that is configured in NPV mode that is creating NPIV connections to my 9513:

sh flogi database

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
INTERFACE        VSAN    FCID           PORT NAME               NODE NAME
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

fc1/13           14    0x9a0100  20:0a:00:0d:ec:ed:8a:c0 20:0e:00:0d:ec:ed:8a:c1

fc1/13           14    0x9a0101  50:01:43:80:06:2f:6f:90 50:01:43:80:06:2f:6f:91
fc1/13           14    0x9a0102  50:01:43:80:04:26:ad:60 50:01:43:80:04:26:ad:61
fc1/13           14    0x9a010f  50:01:43:80:06:2f:6a:44 50:01:43:80:06:2f:6a:45
fc1/13           14    0x9a0117  50:01:43:80:04:26:ad:7c 50:01:43:80:04:26:ad:7d

as you can see multiple WWN have logged-in through the same physical port (fc1/13)

[RaveDave1]

Thank-you for the reply.

Does this mean that if I have NPIV enabled on the switch, I can have an NPIV port and a non-NPIV port on this same switch?

It would just be a matter of configuring individual ports for NPIV other ports while other ports are non-NPIV on a switch that has NPIV enabled?

Does this apply to both the 9148 and 9506 switches?

Dave

[dynamoxxx · Accepted solution]

Does this mean that if I have NPIV enabled on the switch, I can have an NPIV port and a non-NPIV port on this same switch?

correct, some ports can be used for devices that are doing NPIV logins and some for regular devices.

It would just be a matter of configuring individual ports for NPIV other ports while other ports are non-NPIV on a switch that has NPIV enabled?
Does this apply to both the 9148 and 9506 switches?

you don't configure anything on the switch, once NPIV is enabled it's automatic. It applies to both 9148 and 9506

[RaveDave1]

Thanks for the info, that is exactly what I was looking for.

Dave