SAS for SAN

[Helmut Moltke]

Hi,

We will build a SAN network. I am new in the server hardware technologies and because of this I have to learn much things.

As SAS is faster then iSCSI (3 Gb/s and not 1 Gb/s), we want to buy MSA 2000sa G2. Is it possible to have a SAN with the SAS interface? So, we won't implement a DAS.

Thanks.

[Uwe Zessin]

Ludwig,

I would not call a direct SAS-connect a "SAN", but hey, by that definition a direct IP/FC-connect is no SAN either ;-)

Let's face it: the terminology does not really matter - different vendors use different terms anyway.

What matters is your business needs. Are you really looking for maximum bandwidth - regardless of what throughput the array can deliver (do you even have enough disk drives and what is the I/O request pattern) to fill a 1 GigaBit link?

[Helmut Moltke]

As the MSA 2000i and MSA 2000sa have the same price, I would go to the SAS version. It should be possible that two different servers (not more than 4) can share a SAN drive (LVN), as I will use VMware and VMFS. We will use two or three servers.

[Uwe Zessin]

Yes, on VMware it is possible to share MSA2000i/fc/sa volumes without any additional software.

[Helmut Moltke]

What about switches? I couldn'd find any switch for the DL server series. I would like to have redundancy. And if there exists, may I use more then 4 hosts?

Thanks!

[Uwe Zessin · Accepted solution]

As far as I can tell, they don't offer external SAS expanders (switches) today (maybe in the future, but it does not help today).

Redundancy is achived by mounting two adapters in a server and connecting them to both MSA controllers.

Of course, that limits you to 4 hosts. The only way I am aware of to use more servers is to use a blade chassis (c3000/c7000) with embedded SAS switches and connect the external MSA to the embedded SAS switch.