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Connectivity considerations
10 Dell EMC PowerVault ME4 Series and VMware vSphere | 3922-BP-VM
3 Connectivity considerations
ME4 Series storage supports and is certified with VMware vSphere for server connectivity with iSCSI (1Gb
and 10Gb), Fibre Channel (8Gb and 16Gb, direct-attached and SAN-attached), and direct-attached SAS.
While the PowerVault ME4012 or ME4024 array can be configured with a single controller, for maximum
storage availability and performance, it is a best practice to use dual controller configurations. A dual-
controller configuration improves application availability because in the event of a controller failure, the
affected controller fails over to the partner controller with little interruption to data flow. A failed controller can
be replaced without the need to shut down the storage system.
3.1 Direct-attached storage
ME4 Series arrays support direct-attached Fibre Channel, iSCSI, and SAS connectivity. Using direct-attached
hosts removes the financial costs associated with a SAN fabric from the environment but limits the scale to
which the environment can grow. While ME4 Series storage can support up to eight direct-attached servers,
this is achieved by providing only a non-redundant, single connection to each server. As a best practice, each
host should have a dual-path configuration with a single path to each controller, enabling storage access to
continue in the event of controller failure. This limits the number of direct-attached servers to four but enables
controller redundancy and increased performance.
Figure 1 shows a configuration with four servers, each with two connections to the ME4 Series array.
Connecting four hosts directly to a PowerVault ME4024 array with dual paths
Note: Supported Fibre Channel and iSCSI direct-attach configuration operating systems can be found in the
Dell EMC PowerVault ME4 Series Storage System Support Matrix.