Connecting a Dell PowerEdge M1000e to a Cisco MDS9513

1) correct, enabling NPIV is non-disruptive

2) edge is fine

3) i would use existing VSANs,  no need to mess with IVR to get those blades connected to your storage.

I assume Brocade M5424 support access-gateway mode ?

Thanks for the quick response.  Your assumption is correct.

I have another couple of questions:

1.  By enabling NPIV on the Edge switch, will that automatically enable NPIV on my VSAN?  The reason I'm asking is because a document that I found said that the VSAN needs to be configured for NPIV as well.

2.  If I enable NPIV for the other VSAN, how will that affect the active zones in that VSAN?

Thanks!

Sue Flood

1) NPIV is per switch, not per VSAN

2) see #1

Today, I do all my zoning via port.  Can I port zone this or should I WWN zone?  Please let me know any gotcha's with zoning.

Thanks,

Sue Flood

EMC storage.  At first we may use a CX-4-960 and then as the environment grows it will either be a DMX4 or VMAX 20K.  I don't have a real requirement to port zone so I will use WWN zoning for this system.

port zoning ? Do you have requirements for port zoning ? If not please use WWN zoning, create device aliases or fcalias and use those to create your zones. Much more flexible way to do zoning, what storage are you zoning these blades to ?

good, let us know if you need help with CX/Symm zoning

Bethany,

Thank you so much for this information, it is very helpful.

I have just one more question about the zoning. If you go to page 11 of the attachment, you’ll see an example of zoning. In the first step it looks like they put all 3 WWNs in the zone (HBA, storage, and Brocade M5424) and start a format on a lun presented to a host. Once the format starts, the next step says to remove the Brocade M5424 WWN from the zone. Should I do it as this document states or just WWN zone the HBA with the storage?

Sue Flood

Technology Consultant, FDA Account

HP Enterprise Services

sue.flood@hp.com

T +1 704 549 5490

M +1 704 634 9866

Hewlett-Packard Company

10101 Claude Freeman Dr.

Suite 200W

Charlotte, NC 28262

that has to be a typo, you don't need to add switch WWN to the zone, just your initiator and target.

Awesome! Thanks!

Sue Flood

Technology Consultant, FDA Account

HP Enterprise Services

sue.flood@hp.com

T +1 704 549 5490

M +1 704 634 9866

Hewlett-Packard Company

10101 Claude Freeman Dr.

Suite 200W

Charlotte, NC 28262

LOL… ☺

Sue Flood

Technology Consultant, FDA Account

HP Enterprise Services

sue.flood@hp.com

T +1 704 549 5490

M +1 704 634 9866

Hewlett-Packard Company

10101 Claude Freeman Dr.

Suite 200W

Charlotte, NC 28262

someone who works for HP is working on connecting EMC storage to IBM blades ..that is just plane wrong !!!

Hello,

We just got the Brocade m5424 switches on the network.  So when I try to enable AG, I get this error:

Not allowed while Authentication policies are enabled.

So I found some documentation regarding this and for AG mode the Switch Authentication Policy can either be On or Off.  The default is Passive:

M5424:admin> authutil --show

AUTH TYPE     HASH TYPE     GROUP TYPE

--------------------------------------------------------------------

fcap,dhchap     sha1,md5         0,1,2,3,4

Switch Authentication Policy: PASSIVE

Device Authentication Policy: OFF

So I thought I’d try to turn the policy on and I get this message:

M5424:admin> authutil --policy -sw on

DH-CHAP secret or FCAP certificate must be created, before doing this operation

And then I tried to turn the policy off and I get this message:

M5424:admin> authutil --policy -sw off

Warning: Activating the authentication policy requires either DH-CHAP secrets or PKI certificates depending on the protocol selected. Otherwise, ISLs will be segmented during next E-port bring-up.

ARE YOU SURE  (yes, y, no, n): [no]

My question is if I turn it off, will this in anyway affect my Cisco switches and the ISL that I have between the edge and core fabric?

Any assistance that you can provide would be greatly appreciated!

Regards,

Sue Flood

Hello,

We just got the Brocade m5424 switches on the network. So when I try to enable AG, I get this error:

Not allowed while Authentication policies are enabled.

So I found some documentation regarding this and for AG mode the Switch Authentication Policy can either be On or Off. The default is Passive:

M5424:admin> authutil --show

AUTH TYPE HASH TYPE GROUP TYPE

Sue,

i think your message got cut off. If your output has dashes you will need to post it on the forum itself, not through email.