EMC CX4 & Hitachi Disks Multipathing

Question

Hi, We have Hitachi DF 700M disk storage and using it with HDLM for both windows 2003 and red hat. But we bought EMC CX4-120 but HDLM can't manage it. It shows LUn as 4 different disks. We are told that we have to use PowerPath but emc guys don't know what will happen if we install both PP and HDLM. So we don't know what to do. in addition to that, we install PP to a server which HDLM is not available, PP didn't see the Hitachi disk storage too. What is the best practice for multipathing for a situation like this? And where can we find answer? Thank you in advance.

Conor · Accepted Answer

I guess the single biggest drawback of this solution is the administration, two multipathing products that need to updated & managed, two different command sets etc.

If I was in the customer's situation I would look for a software product that could manage both arrays, I'm a Unix guy so maybe investigate if DM-MPIO could manage both or VxDMP from Symantec?

Conor · Answer

Hi,

PowerPath can co-exist with HDLM on the same server but cannot co-manage the same devices.

When PowerPath coexists with other multipathing software, the HBAs must be dedicated to either PowerPath or the third-party software; HBAs cannot be used for both packages.

I don’t see the Hitachi DF700M array listed in the PowerPath support matrix here

https://elabnavigator.emc.com/emcpubs/elab/esm/pdf/EMC_PowerPath.pdf

So your solution would be to have one set of HBA’s accessing Hitachi disks using HDLM and one set of HBA’s attached to the CX4 using PowerPath.

Conor

edusa81 · Answer

Thank you very much for the quick answer. We can try your suggestion. Do you know is there any drawbacks of this solution?

And let me ask something else, Is there any other solution without using HDLM and Powerpath for our multipathing problem?

edusa81 · Answer

Ok, I will check DM-MPIO solution. Thank you.

PowerPath

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