User Manual

Types of supported devices
The 3Gb SAS BL Switch supports the following types of devices:
• Shared storage enclosures, page 8
• Zoned storage enclosures, page 9
• Tape devices, page 9
As shown in the following table, configuration (zoning) procedures are the same for shared SAS
storage enclosures and tape devices, but differ for zoned SAS storage enclosures:
Zoning typeQuantity in
nl
dual-domain
nl
environments
Quantity in
nl
single-domain
nl
environments
Component
16/3216/32Servers
2/41/23Gb SAS BL Switches
11P700m SAS mezzanine cards per server
Switch port21
MSA2000sa controllers
nl
(Shared SAS storage enclosures)
Drive bay
2 per drawer, 4 per
nl
enclosure
1 per drawer, 2 per
nl
enclosure
MDS600 I/O modules
nl
(Zoned SAS storage enclosures)
Switch port2 drives per switch2 drives per switch
1/8 G2 Tape Autoloaders and MSL SAS
Tape Libraries (Tape devices)
included—Dual-port SAS disk drives
—includedSingle-port SATA disk drives
For information about cabling and configuring the switch and any attached devices, see Cabling the
switch, page 17.
Shared storage enclosures
When shared storage enclosures are attached to the switch:
• The storage enclosure includes an embedded RAID array controller, which is used to configure
the logical storage units (LUNs). An example of a shared SAS storage enclosure is the MSA2000sa.
• The BladeSystem server blade must have a RAID array controller installed, which communicates
with the RAID array controller in the storage enclosure, but it is not used for its RAID configuration
capabilities.
• The switch is configured using switch-port zone groups. The entire storage enclosure connected
to that switch port is visible to all server bays granted access to the zone group that includes that
switch port.
NOTE:
Unused switch ports can be included in a zone group, to help plan for future growth.
Introduction8