Botting SAN

[thorchin]

Hi!

I have some doubts about an implememtation.

The environment consists of a chassis UCS 5100, 4 blade server B200M2 with M81KR cards and two 6120XP Fabric. The fabric switch are connected to a Brocade Fibre switch 200C and 5000. The storage is NetApp FAS 3160.

Wanting to set the profile to a server B200M2 making it boot from the SAN, we see that the ports on fiber switches shown the "F" mode. These ports are connected to the fabric 6120XP. The operation mode in the fabric is "ENd Host mode" and fiber ports are listed as "proxy_N." My question is, It's normal in the Brocade switches, the fiber ports with connection to the fabric display "E" mode?

The second question, it is first necessary to set a target boot in the blade profile of the UCS, or if you first have to map the LUN 0 to the vHBA (WWPN ) in the storage device?

Thanks in advance, Regards!

[richard.pugh]

Do you have the Brocade switch ports set in NPIV mode?

[thorchin]

Hi Richard, thanks for respond,

Yes, all ports in Brocade switch in NPIV enable.

Regards,

[kg6itcraig · Accepted solution]

Have found that Windows like a Boot LUN ID of 1. Think any number might work? But 1 is a standard most people I know use.

You have to have a boot profile that aims at the WWPN's of one of more FC ports on your storage device. Example below. In some situations I do port basesd zoning and just mask the LUNs at the storage device, and in others add WWPN based zoning (Brocade) along with LUN masking.

Craig

[thorchin]

Thanks Craig for response,

I configured switch profile for boot SAN like you. The diference is that my LUN have ID 0. But, in your switch FC port,

What is the state that shows the port? N port, F port, E port?

Thanks in advance!!

Regards!

[kg6itcraig · Accepted solution]

From a working system:

Index Port Address Media Speed State     Proto

==============================================

  0   0   011700   id    8G   Online      FC  F-Port  1 N Port + 48 NPIV public (Connection to FI)

  1   1   011500   id    8G   No_Light    FC

  2   2   011300   id    8G   No_Light    FC

  3   3   011100   id    8G   No_Light    FC

  4   4   011600   --    8G   No_Module   FC

  5   5   011400   id    8G   No_Light    FC

  6   6   011200   id    8G   Online      FC  F-Port  20:00:00:00:00:00:00:00 (Connection the SAN Device)

  7   7   011000   id    8G   Online      FC  F-Port  20:00:00:00:0:0:00:0 (Connection the SAN Device)

WWPN's are changed to protect the innocent

Craig

[kg6itcraig]

Think 0 would work also. Any nuber works I think, not sure if the OS sees that in any way that makes a difference.

Craig

[thorchin]

Thanks again Craig!!  A last question. Your FC switch is Brocade??

Regards!

[kg6itcraig · Accepted solution]

Dual Brocade 310's.

Craig

[thorchin]

Thanks Graig!!

Best Regards!!

[DAVE GENTON]

NO not true shouldnt post that to others if not sure, despite number bootable must be masked to zero for many applications still today.

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[rewilkin]

I agree with Dave, best practice with boot from san is the boot LUN should and always be zero when possible. I have seen LUN 1 work, but that is not recommended. EMC and NetApp arrays are supported with UCS and we do not just use any number. Had a peer of mine just contact me the other day because he was getting a blinking cursor in the top left hand corner when doing bfs, I asked is boot policy correct, yes. Is zoning correct, yes. What is the boot LUN id? It was 2, had him change it to 0 and it worked like a charm.

Remember, the boot policy is the "magic sauce" when doing bfs with UCS. Once you point to the correct targets, you then create and bind your luns at the array level and only have to create one boot policy.

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[kg6itcraig]

Have had two storage vendors tell me 1! Have a few hundered windows 2008R2 servers doing fine with 1.

BUT will have to do some testing, and in time change to 0.

Thanks!

Craig

[DAVE GENTON]

Leave at 0 if booting that is only way some will boot so keeping them consisteny helps, also must be same for vmotion also. 0 should always be used for bootable luns as a best practice.

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[rewilkin]

I never said LUN 1 would not work, history of boot from San says LUN 0 is "best practice".

Also, based on the type of array you are using to boot from san, zero will be used by the array. EMC Symmetrix/VMAX will sometimes do that, so you have to use One as the boot LUN.

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