EMC Migration to Fabric Interconnects

[Thomas Yarger]

Experts, 

I currently have an EMC VNX 5300 that plugs into two Brocade 5100 switches that then connect to two UCS Fabric Interconnects. My goal is to eliminate the Brocade 5100 switches and directly plug the EMC SAN into the FI's. The EMC SAN has four Fiber Optic cables plugging into the Brocade switches in a staggered format for redundancy purposes. Since our environment isn't complex, I was planning on leaving the FC traffic on VSAN 1. 

Would it be as simple as unplugging the Brocade switches from the FI's and plugging the EMC SAN Fiber Optic into the same ports the Brocade was plugged into? 

Thanks. Best. 

[Mohammed Majid Hussain]

You'd need to configure zoning and storage ports on the FI's.

Here's an article with some great info on the same

http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/support/docs/servers-unified-computing/ucs-infrastructure-ucs-manager-software/116082-config-ucs-das-00.html

 -Majid

[Walter Dey]

Hi Thomas

my 2c ( I just migrated a huge UCS installation from direct attached storage to SAN)

which is disruptive !! FI FC End Host Mode to (from) FC Switch mode requires reboot of both FI !

- Don't use VSAN 1 ! but create different VSAN's on FI-A and FI-B e.g. 20 and 30.

- The VSAN's for FC EHM Need "No Zoning" ticked !

- just be aware hat the FC implementation on the UCS FI is NOT 100% compatible with SAN-OS (MDS and/or N5k)

- DAS is cool for a test / lab Environment ! I would never recommend it for production.

Walter.

[Thomas Yarger]

Hey Walter, 

Thanks for info! Why not use VSAN 1? Is that a design caveat or just best practices?  

Why not use it in a production network? Just curious to your reasoning. 

[Walter Dey]

Hi Thomas

Why not use VSAN 1? Is that a design caveat or just best practices?  

Best practise btw. like not using VLAN 1 ! in FC we use 2 separate fabrics A and B, with separate zoning per fabric. VSAN is a fabric, and therefore make them unique, by using different numbers for A and B.

Lets assume someone would put a wire between a port in fabric A with one in fabric B. with A and B in same VSAN, this would merge the 2 fabrics, which is a disaster. If you use 2 different numbers, nothing happens (no merge).

Why not use it in a production network? Just curious to your reasoning. 

Each VSAN per switch has a domain-id; in UCS FC switch mode, it is automatic, and cannot be configured.

Enhanced zoning (per VSAN) is also not supported !

Walter.

PS my customers inital use case for DAS: I don't rely on SAN guys to do the zoning ! server folks can do it all !

Pushback from SAN guys, when a complete new SAN was installed: We don't want this additional UCS FC switches in our fabric !