Information Center Errata - NetApp E Series Virtualised Storage

Content

Last Update

This document was last updated: September 8th 2016

Change History

The following revisions have been made to this document:

Revision Date	Sections Modified
06/08/14	New publication
08/10/15	Support firmware levels of NetApp E-Series
	Concurrent maintenance on NetApp E-Series
	SVC Controller Recognition
	Technical speciation for E-Series
	Target Ports
04/04/2016	Support firmware levels of NetApp E-Series
	SVC Controller Recognition
23/08/2016	Support firmware levels of NetApp E-Series
	SVC Controller Recognition
08/09/2016	SVC Controller Recognition
	Technical speciation for E-Series
	Target Ports

Table 1: Change History

Chapter. Configuring the NetApp E-Series

This portion of the document covers the necessary configuration for using a NetApp E-Series with an IBM SAN Volume Controller cluster.

Note; IBM DS3000, DS4000 and DS5000 are also earlier model equivalents for general settings.

Support models of NetApp E-Series

For the NetApp E-Series models supported for use with the IBM SVC
please see SSIC & the IBM Web matrices.

http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=ssg1S1005419#_Netapp

Support firmware levels of NetApp E-Series

At present, E-Series supports for 7.84.x, 7.86.x, 8.10.x, 8.20.x, 8.25.x, 8.30.x Controller firmware levels for SVC.

For supported firrmware levels for each model,
Consult: - http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=ssg1S1005419#_Netapp

Concurrent maintenance on NetApp E-Series

Concurrent Firmware upgrades are supported as per NetApp E-Series procedures.
Offline FW upgrade is recommended for drives and enclosures.
Online FW upgrade is supported starting with Controller FW 8.20.x.

NetApp E-Series interface

This is the NetApp SANtricity Storage Manager GUI.

There is also a CLI accessed via ssh sessions from a SANtricity installed host.

The LUNs are provisioned from the E-Series as volumes (LUNs), these appear as mdisks on the SVC, which can then use them to make mdiskgroups and provision vdisks for use by hosts or for use with Tiering.


SVC Controller Recognition

Models are differentiated by SCSI Board ID, not shown under svcinfo lscontroller X.
Depending on Model Type SVC will show these VENDOR / PRODUCT Ids;

Model	vendor_id	product_id	Board id	product_revision
E54xx EF540	LSI LSI	INF-01-00 INF-01-00	5468 5468	9786 9786
E26xx	LSI	INF-01-00	2660	9786
E55xx EF550 E55xx EF550	NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP	INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00	5501 5501 5501 5501	8820 8820 9825 9825
E27xx	NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP	INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00	2701 2701 2701	8820 9825 0830
E28xx	NETAPP	INF-01-00	2800	0830
E56xx EF560 E56xx EF560 E56xx EF560	NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP NETAPP	INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00 INF-01-00	5600 5600 5600 5600 5600 5600	9820 9820 9825 9825 0830 0830

Technical speciation for E-Series

There are three form factors for each E-Series system models.
4U/60 Drives
2U/24 Drives
2U/12 Drives

Refer the following pages for additional info.

for E26xx:
http://www.netapp.com/us/products/storage-systems/e2600/e2600-tech-specs.aspx
for E27xx:
http://www.netapp.com/us/products/storage-systems/e2700/e2700-tech-specs.aspx
for E28xx:
http://www.netapp.com/us/products/storage-systems/e2800/e2800-tech-specs.aspx

for E54xx:
http://www.netapp.com/us/products/storage-systems/e5400/e5400-tech-specs.aspx
for E55xx:
http://www.netapp.com/us/products/storage-systems/e5500/e5500-tech-specs.aspx
for E56xx:
http://www.netapp.com/us/products/storage-systems/e5600/e5600-tech-specs.aspx

Logical units and target ports on NetApp E-Series

LUNs

LUN Size
For regular volume groups, the maximum volume size is only limited by the size of the drives and the maximum number of drives in the volume group (based on the RAID level).
For an example, RAID 5 and RAID 6 volume groups, the maximum number of drive in the volume group is 30.
For Dynamic Disk Pool , the maximum volume size is 64TB





LUN Mapping

NetApp E-Series can export 256 LUNs to the SVC Controller (SVC limit).
Greater than 2TB LUNs are supported by SVC. SVC has a maximum LUN size of 1PB.



LUN IDs

NetApp E-Series will identify exported Logical Units through
SCSI Identification Descriptor type 3.
The 64-bit, NAA IEEE Registered Extended Identifier (NAA=6)
for the Logical Unit is in the form;
6-OUI-VSID .
The LSI E-Series IEEE Company ID is 0x00A0B8
The NetApp E-SeriesIEEE Company ID is of 0x0080E5
the rest is vendor specific ID.


Configure IBM SVC including Logical Drives and Hosts.

Settings are in general default unless specified.
See functions section.

To Modify, Resize, or destroy a LUN,.

The LUN must be removed from any SVC mdiskgroup and be in an “unmanaged” state before any modifications on the controller.

*** Note: Make sure the mdisk is unmanaged (removed from any mdiskgroup) on the SVC Cluster before deleting the LUN on the IBM NetApp E-Series storage system.


*** Note: Do not use array expansion on LUNs that are in use by a SAN Volume Controller cluster. For this to be recognised by SVC the mdisk must
be first made unmanaged by migrating or deleting from the MDiskGroup.

LUN Presentation

LUNs are exported through the NetApp E-SeriesSAN storage system’s available FC ports. Configure these explicitly, do not use default mapping to guarantee unique SVC access.






Special LUNs

There are no special considerations to a Logical Unit numbering. LUN 0 may be exported where necessary.

The access LUN, also known as the Universal Transport Mechanism (UTM) LUN, is the configuration interface for NetApp E-Series systems.

The access LUN might not be in a partition that contains the SAN Volume Controller ports because it is not required by the SAN Volume Controller clustered system. The UTM LUN is a special LUN that allows NetApp E-Series systems to be configured through suitable software over the Fibre Channel connection.

Because the SAN Volume Controller does not require the UTM LUN, it does not generate errors either way. E-Series systems must not have the Access UTM LUN that is presented as LUN 0 (zero).

It is possible to use in-band (over Fibre Channel) and out-of-band (over Ethernet) to allow the configuration software to communicate with more than one E-Series system. If you are using in-band configuration, the Access UTM LUN must be configured in a partition that does not include any logical units that are accessed by the SAN Volume Controller system.

Note: In-band is not supported for access to the LUN while in the SAN Volume Controller partition.

Target Ports

A NetApp E-Series storage system can have a total of 8 fibre channel (4ports on each controller) ports with following speed levels.
E26xx: 8Gb FC
E54xx: 8Gb FC
EF540: 8Gb FC
E27xx: 16Gb FC
E28xx: 16Gb FC
E55xx: 16Gb FC
EF550: 16Gb FC
E56xx : 16Gb FC
EF560 : 16Gb FC

Example of a WWNN and WWPN
20020080e5290640: WWNN
20120080e5290640: so this a WWPN for Port 1 on Controller A
20430080e5290640: so this a WWPN for Port 4 on Controller B

Refer the Storage array profile on the summary tab (NetApp SANtricity Storage Manager GUI) for more info.

LU access model

Current E-Series controllers are Asymmetric Active/Active. In all conditions, it is recommended to cross connect the ports across FC switches to avoid an outage from controller failure.
All NetApp E-Series controllers are equal in priority so there is no benefit to using an exclusive set for a specific LU.
LU preferred access port

There are no preferred access ports on the NetApp E-Series as all ports are Asymmetric Active/Active across all controllers.


Switch zoning limitations for E-Series

There are no zoning limitations for NetApp E-Series.

The NetApp E-Series systems present itself by default to a SAN Volume Controller cluster as a single WWNN system with a WWPN for each port zoned to the SAN Volume Controller. For example, if one of these storage systems has 4 ports zoned to the SAN Volume Controller, it appears as a controller with 4 WWPNs. A given logical unit (LU) must be mapped to the SAN Volume Controller through all controller ports zoned to the SAN Volume Controller using the same logical unit number (LUN).

The controller must be separately zoned to SVC ports for exclusivity requirements.

Fabric zoning

Dual Fabrics for robustness is the minimum requirement.

Controllers should be zoned individually. SVC must have unique access to the LUNs.

The NetApp Controller fabric zone will contain all the SVC ports and at least one
port from each of the NetApp E-Series storage systems controllers, for robustness.

Target port sharing

The NetApp E-Series storage system supports LUN masking to enable multiple servers to access separate LUNs through a common controller port.
Explicit masking is to be used with SVC, to guarantee the necessary unique LUN access.


Host splitting

This can be used. Hosts connecting to SVC and the Controller. SVC must have sole
access to its LUNs. There may be MPIO interaction considerations, see the SVC support website for details of supported host multipathing.


Controller splitting

This is supported. SVC does not need exclusive access to the Controller.
Explicit mapping is required for LUNs exclusive use by SVC.
As SVC will not be aware of any other use of the controller, performance may be affected.

Configuration settings for NetApp E-Series storage system

The GUI access enables the intuitive setup of the NetApp E-Series storage system LUNs and masking/export to the SAN Volume Controller cluster.

The setup is straightforward;. SVC will see the controller without a LUN being presented. LUNs should be masked exclusively to SVC as a host group.

You must configure the following settings for NetApp E-Series systems:
· Set the host type for SAN Volume Controller to SVC.
· Set the system so that both storage systems have the same worldwide node name (WWNN).

· Ensure that the AVT option is enabled. The host type selection should have already enabled the AVT option. View the storage system profile data to confirm that you have the AVT option enabled.

· You must have the following options enabled on any logical units that are mapped to NetApp E-Series systems:

· read caching
· write caching
· write cache mirroring
· You must not have caching without batteries enabled.

Quorum disks on NetApp E-Series

The SAN volume Controller cluster can select disks that are presented by the NetApp E-Series storage system as quorum disks. To maintain availability with the cluster, ideally each quorum disk should reside on a separate disk subsystem.

Clearing SCSI reservations and registrations

This should never be done; LUNs must be exclusive to SVC.

Functions for NetApp E-Series storage system

Copy Functions
The NetApp E-Series's replication and snapshot features are not supported under SVC.

Dynamic Pools
Dynamic Disk Pools are supported.


Thin Provisioning
Thin Provisioned LUNs are supported. Care must be taken for the LUNs not to become over allocated or SVC will take the mdisk and its mdiskgroup offline, until corrected.

Controller run diagnostics

Diagnostics are automatically recovered by the SAN Volume Controller system. After the controller run diagnostics option is used, check your managed disks (MDisks) to ensure that they have not been set to degraded mode.

Controller disable data transfer

The controller disable data transfer option is not supported when a SAN Volume Controller is attached to NetApp E-Series systems.

Setting an array Offline

Do not set an array offline because you can lose access to the storage pool.

Array increase capacity

The array increase capacity option is supported, but the new capacity is not usable until the MDisk is removed from the storage pool and re-added to the storage pool. You might have to migrate data to increase the capacity.

Redistribute logical drives or change ownership of the preferred path

You can redistribute logical drives or change ownership of the preferred path; however, these options might not take effect until a discovery is started on the SAN Volume Controller clustered system. You can use the detectdisk command-line interface (CLI) command to restart a system discovery process. The discovery process rescans the Fibre Channel network to discover any new MDisks that might have been added to the system and to rebalance MDisk access across the available storage system ports.

Controller reset

You must only use the controller reset option if you are directed to do so by IBM Service and the alternate controller is functional and available to the SAN. The SAN Volume Controller reset is automatically recovered by the SAN Volume Controller system.

Check your MDisks to ensure that they have not been set to the degraded state during the controller reset process. You can issue the includemdisk CLI command to repair degraded MDisks.