2 node StoreVirtual3000 - additional FOM license?

[preecy]

We are looking to purchase two HPE StoreVirtual 3200 SANs. Both nodes will be located in the same LAN/office and we intend to setup network raid10.

To ensure quorum we would like to delploy a FOM vapp or a file witness. Would we need to purchase additional licenses/support for the FOM/witness server? We are getting conflicting advise from our resellers.

[CalvinZito]

If you're using the two StoreVirtual 3200s in a scale-out or stretched cluster, you'll need a license for the Advanced Data Services. There's not additional licensing for the FOM.  Here's a ChalkTalk I did with an overview of the StoreVirtual 3200: https://youtu.be/cmBdIwwnjXQ

Here's also a podcast I did with the 3200 Technical Marketing Manager that dives a bit deeper. You can find the podcast on my blog: https://community.hpe.com/t5/Around-the-Storage-Block/Deep-Dive-Podcast-on-the-HPE-StoreVirtual-3200/ba-p/6953125

I don't believe the NFS file quorum witness is supported with the 3200 - only the FOM is available today. 

[HPstorageTom]

The 2-node quorum is not available for SV3200.

You need to use the FOM - which is available without any additional license .

[preecy]

Both SV3200 nodes will be in the same site (scale-out) and we intend on using NR10.

Will we requre the Advanced Data Service license or can we simply setup a FOM?

thanks in advance

[CalvinZito]

You only need the FOM if you're doing multi-site. If you were doing multi-site, there's not additional licensing for the FOM however you would need the Advanced Data Services license on both systems.

To do scale-out of two systems, you do need the Advanced Data Services (ADS) license on both systems. US List Price of the ADS is $3442. One other note: scale-out is only supported with iSCSI. 

[preecy]

Oh i see. That could be a problem as we havent budgeted for the ADS licenses but the requirement is to go with NR10 over two nodes!

I manage another network (completely seperate company/site) where we have two SV P4530 nodes and a FOM. Again these are setup using NR10 but i dont recall purchasing the ADS licenses for these?

[CalvinZito · Accepted solution]

Let me first highly recommend that you listen to the podcast I did with technical marketing diving into the StoreVirtual 3200 and how it's different from the traditional StoreVirtual 4000. You can either use this link to download the MP3 (right click and save the file) or a browser will open to play it if you click on the link.. 

While the StoreVirtual 3200 and the StoreVirtual 4530 share a common DNA (of the LeftHand OS), they are very different.  The StoreVirtual 3200 is a dual controller array. As such, all active components are redundant. it is a system by itself.  You don't have to get a second 3200 unless you want a multi-site cluster or you want higher levels of performance, scale, or HA with scale-out. What's also very different is you can add upto 3 disk enclosures to a single StoreVirtual 3200 to scale-up capacity.   

A StoreVirtual 4530 is a single node and by itself is a single point of failure. It was architected to be part of a cluster to increase availability, capacity and performance. So there was no additional licensing needed because EVERY StoreVirtual 4000 was intended to be part of a cluster. 

The price of a base StoreVirtual 3200 is very, very low (US street price is around $6000 for it). Since scale-out and multi-site are optional features, they do require additional licensing. We did this so we could make the price of the entry system as low as possible. 

If I were you, I'd be asking if you really need scale-out because you have a highly available solution with one dual controller SV 3200.  You can certainly do better with the ADS and scale-out, but it isn't needed. 

[preecy]

Ok thanks that makes much more sense now.
Thanks for the link to the podcast, too that answered some other queries i had.