Cabling the cluster

Follow the procedure to cable the cluster on the IBM® Storage Ready Node hardware.

About this task

Below are example images of the R750, R760XL, and R6625XL nodes which can be used as a guide when viewing the more generalized diagrams that follow. The most common deployment scenario that is documented below uses 2x high speed network ports for the Bond0 network interface. The R750 comes supplied with 10GbE ports where as the R760XL and R6625XL come with mixed media 10/25GbE ports capable of either speed.

The back panel figure shows how to cable the network connections.

Note: The back panel on the IBM Storage Ready Node might differ from what is shown in the figure.

• On the IBM Storage Ready Node, the Bond0 ports are located near the center of the system.
• Optionally, you can use Fibre Channel ports for SAN connectivity. The Fibre Channel ports are located in the upper-right corner of the IBM Storage Ready Node.

To cable the cluster, complete the following steps:

1. Connect four network cables to the 10 GbE ports of a single switch. Connect the other ends of the four network cables to the left 10 GbE ports of the cluster as shown in the figure. Optionally, you can substitute a Fiber Optic SFP+cable for the coaxial cable.
   Note: All network connections must be connected to a 10 GbE network. Connecting to a 1 GbE network is not supported.
2. Connect four network cables to the 10 GbE ports of a different switch as shown in the figure. Connect the other ends of the four network cables to the right 10 GbE ports of the cluster.
   Note: All network connections must be connected to a 10 GbE network. Connecting to a 1 GbE network is not supported.
3. Connect the four blue Cat 6 network cables to 1 GbE ports in a switch as shown in the figure. Connect the other ends of the cables to the IPMI 1 GbE ports in the cluster.
4. Connect the power cables to two different power sources.