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210274
iSCSI Enabled NICs
Hey guys,
On our rev III 9th gen servers we now have an option for the onboard NICs to be "iSCSI enabled".
Can someone reply with 1) what this is, an 2) what this is not?
It seems to be an alternative to an iSCSI HBA. But I'm getting mixed info on exactly what functionality this adds to the onboard NICS :-(
--Brian
On our rev III 9th gen servers we now have an option for the onboard NICs to be "iSCSI enabled".
Can someone reply with 1) what this is, an 2) what this is not?
It seems to be an alternative to an iSCSI HBA. But I'm getting mixed info on exactly what functionality this adds to the onboard NICS :-(
--Brian
MarcusW01
116 Posts
0
August 17th, 2009 04:00
I checked the docs about ISCSI boot http://support.euro.dell.com/support/edocs/network/BroadCom/R125875/en/iscsi.htm (Broadcom 57xx series) and also verfied the docs http://www.vmware.com/pdf/vsphere4/r40/vsp_40_iscsi_san_cfg.pdf and also verified an example with MD 3000I http://support.euro.dell.com/support/edocs/network/BFi/ to get an idea about.
My conclusion : I think its possible to create a bootable ESX (maybe with 3rd party tool) with flashed nics of the R805 ,but all in all VMWARE recommends, if using ESX booting from ISCSI, to use an ISCSI HBA such as QLOGIC ones and only supports it, that counts in my opinion. Well, sure thing you can do and setup, create and configure "limits", but its still not supported of the vendor as well as there are limitations of the hardware vendor, it does not count if its dell, hp or ibm or somewhere else.I had several discussions about sense of booting an ESX from ISCSI (in most cases you have got an usb stick with the installation or a SD card or local drives (which I definately recommend i.e. 2 73 gb sas drives raid 1 with a sas 6 ir , a perc controller is too oversized).
2nd part follows
MarcusW01
116 Posts
0
August 17th, 2009 04:00
If using an iscsi disk for a virtual machine, you can use raw disks (but be aware of limitations). All in all VMWARE recommends an ISCSI HBA and qlogic is one of the vendors and this config is supported, other configs, ideas ,etc. are still "beta" and not supported, well for a non productive enviroment, its an idea to flash the nics of the r805 and config them to boot from iscsi and if its works, well done.
I`m happy that VMWARE upgraded the Kernel and Jumbo frames are now possible even with a software initiator, on ESX 3.5 there was a "workaround" to enbale jumbos on software initiator, but well, that was a thing like "you do it on your own" *g Depending of attached ISCSI storage I recommend if using booting from ISCSI , use an ISCSI HBA which is supproted of vmware, then you won`t get trouble with possible config issues and support limits.
Hopefully this helps you to decide
Best regards
Marcus
budd79
6 Posts
0
January 15th, 2010 09:00
We have a PE R805 with Broadcom BCM5708C netXtreme II. We have downloaded the latest driver and firmware and are trying to use the on board iSCSI adapter to connect to our san box.
We believe we are doing the connection properly, but the drive never shows up in the disk management. When we check on the iSCSI server it does show that the server is conencted, but nothing.
We are using the Windows 2008 R2 x64 iscsi connector to try and connect.
budd79
6 Posts
0
January 15th, 2010 09:00
We have a PE R805 with Broadcom BCM5708C netXtreme II. We have downloaded the latest driver and firmware and are trying to use the on board iSCSI adapter to connect to our san box.
We believe we are doing the connection properly, but the drive never shows up in the disk management. When we check on the iSCSI server it does show that the server is conencted, but nothing.
We are using the Windows 2008 R2 x64 iscsi connector to try and connect.
Scott Hanson
342 Posts
0
January 15th, 2010 11:00
Here's a demo video that shows EMC iSCSI all thr way through using the iSCSI initiator on W2K08 that Jeff did in the lab, might help - http://www.delltechcenter.com/page/Connecting+to+Dell+EMC+iSCSI
This page might be of help also, although a little dated - http://www.delltechcenter.com/page/Enabling+iSCSI+Adapter+on+Broadcom+5708+on+R805
There's also a really good walkthrough here - http://www.windowsnetworking.com/articles_tutorials/Connect-Windows-Server-2008-Windows-Vista-iSCSI-Server.html
Hopefully that gets you in the right direction.
budd79
6 Posts
0
January 15th, 2010 12:00
Thanks for the quick reply.
I've followed both these steps and neither seem to work. I'm starting to believe it may be the san box we are trying to use. We aren't using a real san box, we are just in the developing stages and are exploring a product called Starwind http://www.starwindsoftware.com/starwind. Its seems to work fine when using MS iscsi adapter but doesn't work when using the broadcom adapter.
Strange I guess. I would have preferred to use the Broadcom but it doesn’t look like it’s compatible. I might be forced to use the ms one.
Thanks for the quick reply.