MSA 1000 and FC HBA 2101Multiple drives?

[CA1332969]

Hi

I setup my SAN a while ago and all has been running fine. One of the servers connected (W2k3 DL380 with FC2101)need some more space.
I created the drive and set the SSP and then rebooted the Server. Now in disk management there are 4 disks detected (should be 2). Three of the disks still need to be inisalized and are showing with the no entry sign.

There is only one fibre controller in the server and as far as i can tell the firmware is all the same as other servers that seem to work fine.

Any Ideas??


Thanks

Nathan

[Steven Clementi]

Nathan:

Can you post a screen capture of the SSp settings and the Disk Manager?


Did you double check SSp to see if there was anything else presented?

Is this an MSA with 2 MSA1000 controllers?

Do you have both controllers cabled up to 1 switch?


Steven

[CA1063111]

Hallo,
I think you have a SAN DIsk Storrage with to Paths from Server to Storages. Windows LDM discover every LUN over every PAth (SAN Switch/HBA´s). Install the free MPIO Driver or HP Secure Path Software.

[Uwe Zessin]

Not a good idea, I think.

First priority, what Steven has already begun, is to find out what the situation really is.

If the server has a single Fibre Channel adapter, then it must not have access (and thus two paths) to both MSA controllers.

[CA1332969]

Hi all and thanks for the replys...

I will try to post a screen shot later as need to go to a meeting now.

Yes the MSA 1000 does have to controllers on different switches. As for the Ssp the drives are only presented to this server and a Tape libary.

I have now initalised the drives and they have come on line and work normally however this is not ideal.

Thanks again for the respose i will postthe screeny in about 1 hour

[CA1332969]

Hi all,


Thae server in question is the one labeled Alpha.

Thanks again

[CA1063111]

Hallo,
has the two SAN Switches a connection from one to another ?
Please publish a screeshot from the Windows LDM

[CA1332969]

Yes the switches have a connecting cable.

This is not a problem on other servers connected to the SAN.

Thanks again

[Steven Clementi · Accepted solution]

Nathan:


The first problem I see is that even though your server are "working", you are i na somewhat dangerous situation, as well as unsupported configuration.

The same host bus adaptor should not be able to see both MSA1000 controllers. If you have to keep the 2 switches ISL'ed for other reasons, you should then configure zoning so that only 1 controller can be seen by each server.

This leads me to the next issue. If you have dual MSA controllers and only single hba's, are there any servers with dual hba's? Doesn't look lke it based on the SSP screenshot. (Which is good for the moment). If your controllers ever encounter a failover, you may lose some.. all.. or no data, but the potential to lose data is there.

My suggestion would be, for the time being, remove the second MSA controller at least until you either ramp up with dual HBA's and multipath software or decide to otherwise leave it out of the picture since, you can't really make proper use of it anyway.

You can leave it in and disconnected, but a failover can still occer. If disconected though, there is a much less of a chance for data loss/corruption.



Steven

[CA1332969]

Steven

Thanks for your post I will disconnect the second switch. At the moment this only has the second controller attached. The plan was to purchase secondry HBAs for the servers so i will make this a high priorty.

Strange that the other servers do not see the second controller... I will have to see if the switches are all configure correctly.


Thanks Again