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MD3200i 2 Node Setup
Hi Guys,
I have a Dell Powervault MD3200i SAN that I plan to use for a 2 node Hyper-V cluster. I understand this is an old piece of kit, but this is just for a test lab of mine. I am not going to be using switches for the iSCSI configuration, I would like to use a direct connection from the SAN controllers to my Nodes. Each node has a quad NIC card dedicated for iSCSI, that's 4 ports per host, and my SAN has 2 controllers.
I am struggling with the subnet and which ports to connect to. I am trying to achieve good performance, and I know this comes down to how iSCSI is setup correctly.
The Dell Deployment guide for this SAN confuses me because the examples it gives either involves switches, or Direct Connection with 3 hosts.
Could someone kindly tell me what I need to configure my Controllers and Hosts with in terms of IP Subnet, and also which port to connect?
Example.
SAN Controller 0 Port 0 - Node 1, NIC 1
SAN Controller 1 Port 0 - Node 2, NiC 2 etc
The only spare switches I have available for this project are some old HP Procurve-1810, which are gigabit but not brilliant for iSCSI, which is why I think a direct connection would be better for performance.
Best regards
James
DELL-Sam L
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June 18th, 2019 14:00
Hello James,
What you need to do is to have 2 connections per MD3200i controller to each host. You will want to make sure that each host is connected to both controllers so that if you have a port fail on your MD3200i controller that it can still work on the second port. Here is how you will want to configure your ports.
Controller A port 0 connected to Node 1 NIC 1
Controller A port 1 connected to Node 2 NIC 1
Controller A port 2 connected to Node 1 NIC 2
Controller A port 3 connected to Node 2 NIC 2
Controller B port 0 connected to Node 1 NIC 3
Controller B port 1 connected to Node 2 NIC 3
Controller B port 2 connected to Node 1 NIC 4
Controller B port 3 connected to Node 2 NIC 4
For your iSCSI IP’s you can follow the worksheet that is on page 35 of the deployment guide. Each iSCSI port on your MD3200i needs to be in its own subnet, otherwise your MD3200i will not preform correctly. you will also need to make sure that your nic ports on your host are also in the same subnet that each port on your MD3200i is in so that it can create the connection to your MD3200i.
Please let us know if you have any other questions.