FW 07.00.00/HAFM SW 08.06.00 McDATA Products in a SAN Environment Planning Manual (620-000124-500, April 2005)

Planning Considerations for Fibre Channel Topologies

3-11

Planning Considerations for Fibre Channel Topologies

Planning for Fabric-Attached Loop Connectivity

Public arbitrated loop topology supports the connection of

workgroup or departmental FC-AL devices to a switched fabric

through any

4300 and 4500 Fabric Switch port active as an E_Port. This

topology is well-suited to:

• Providing connectivity between a workgroup or departmental

SAN and a switched fabric, thus implementing connectivity of

FC-AL devices to fabric devices at the core of the enterprise.

• Consolidating low-cost Windows NT or Unix server connections

and providing access to fabric-attached storage devices.

• Consolidating FC-AL tape device connections and providing

access to fabric-attached servers.

NOTE: For the Sphereon 4300 Switch, E_Port connectivity is not standard

and must be configured through an optional product feature enablement

(PFE) key

Connecting FC-AL

Devices to a

Switched Fabric

Sphereon 4300 and 4500 Fabric Switches provide dynamic connectivity

between FC-AL devices and directors or switches participating in a

switched fabric. This function allows multiple low-cost or low-

bandwidth departmental or workgroup devices to communicate with

fabric-attached devices through a high-bandwidth link and provides

connectivity as required to an enterprise SAN environment. This

approach provides:

• Cost-effective FC-AL device connectivity to a switched fabric. A

loop switch provides fabric connectivity without incurring true

switched fabric costs.

• Improved access and sharing of data and computing resources

throughout an organization by connecting isolated departmental

or workgroup devices to the core data center. Fabric-to-loop

connectivity ensures edge servers have access to enterprise

storage, and edge peripherals have access to enterprise

computing resources.