HP Gbe2c L2/L3 iSCSI Switch uplinking

[DruHelgesen]

I inherited a BladeSystem c7000 with GbE2C interconnect blades.  2 of the blades are utilized for iSCSI network traffic to a VNX SAN.  Currently there is a single uplink from the GbE2C to the iSCSI storage switch (which does have 4 uplinks from the VNX.)  I want to make 4 uplink ports from the GbE2C to the iSCSI storage switch.  Should these uplinks then be setup as an LACP group?  I want to think the answer is yes but want to get confirmation before I start messing around with the network settings on the blade and iscsi storage switches.

[scharchouf]

You would like to increase bandwith? that's right?

[DruHelgesen]

Yes.  To me it seems like a problem when the VNX SAN uplinks 4 gb connections and then the blade switch only uplinks 1.  So I want to confirm how the uplinks should be set up.

[scharchouf]

Just need information about VNX SAN, can you send me the technical specifications of the VNX SAN?

[DruHelgesen]

Not completely sure what you are looking for, but here is a link to some specs. https://www.emc.com/collateral/software/specification-sheet/h12014-vnx5100-5300-5500-5700-7500-ss.pdf

What I am looking at (boiling it down) is that I have a c7000 chassis, it has a Gbe2c interconnect switch.  I have a procurve 2910al swicth.  On th VNX I have 4 unique connections for iSCSI connectivity to the procurve switch.  for best bandwidth usage and speed I believe there should be more then a single uplink from the Gbe2c to the 2910al.  Presuming that is the case, how should that be setup?

[scharchouf]

Je vous communique cette solution pour un Switch CISCO, et c'est presque pareil pour un autre Modèle :

Issue

The customer would like to increase the bandwidth between the core Cisco 3750 and the HP GbE2c Ethernet Blade switches in the C7000 enclosure.

Solution

First, we created an Etherchannel on the Cisco 3750. In this instance, we selected two ports and made them a member of channel-group 1 with a mode active :

Switch#config t  
Enter configuration commands, one per line.  End with CNTL/Z.  
Switch(config)#interface range Gi1/0/21-22  
Switch(config-if-range)#channel-group 1 mode active  
Creating a port-channel interface Port-channel 1

We then needed to create a corresponding port aggregate on the HP GbE2c. In this instance, we used ports 20 and 21:

>> Main# /c/l2/lacp/port 20

[LACP Port 20 Menu]       
mode     - Set LACP mode       
prio     - Set LACP port priority       
adminkey - Set LACP port admin key       
cur      - Display current LACP port configuration    

>> LACP Port 20# mode active

Current Port LACP mode setting: off
New Port LACP mode setting: active

>> LACP Port 20#..

[LACP Menu]

sysprio  - Set LACP system priority 
timeout  - Set LACP system timeout scale for timing out partner port     
cur      - Display current LACP configuration  

>> LACP# port 21

[LACP Port 21 Menu]  
mode     - Set LACP mode 
prio     - Set LACP port priority 
adminkey - Set LACP port admin key 
cur      - Display current LACP port configuration  

>> LACP Port 21# mode active

Current Port LACP mode setting: off
New Port LACP mode setting: active

>> LACP Port 21# adminkey 20 
Current LACP port adminkey:     21 
New pending LACP port adminkey: 20  

>> LACP Port 21#

Note that when we configured the first port (20) for LACP, we simply set the mode to active. Port 20 then used its default adminkey of 20. When we went to the port 21 menu, we also set it as mode active, but we had to do the additional step of specifying adminkey 20. This is necessary to force port 21 not to use its default adminkey of 21, but rather to join with port 20 in the LACP channel. This is how the actual port aggregation is accomplished, similar in concept to a Po interface on a Cisco as noted previously.

Then we need to apply and save the new configuration:

>> LACP Port 21#apply

Apply complete; do not forget to save the updated configuration.

>> Main# save

Request will first copy the FLASH "active" config to "backup", then overlay FLASH "active" with new config.
Confirm saving to FLASH [y/n]: y
.
.
.

New config successfully saved to FLASH.

Switch is currently set to use factory default config block on next boot.
Confirm change that to the active config block [y/n]: y
.
.

Next boot will use active config block.

When we dump the config with the new LACP channel, it will look similar to this:

>> Main#/c/dump

/c/l2/lacp/port 20 
                mode active  
/c/l2/lacp/port 21              
                mode active                          
                adminkey 20  
/* /c/l3/if 256  
/*      addr <dhcp>  
/*      ena  
/* /c/l3/gw 4  
/*      ena  
/*      addr <dhcp>  
/  script end  
/***DO NOT EDIT THIS LINE!
/

After the cables are attached, we can verify our new Etherchannel from the Cisco end. We are looking for a status of (P) ; any other status would indicate an issue with the channel forming:

Switch#sho etherchannel sum

Flags:

D - down
P - bundled in port-channel
I - stand-alone
s - suspended
H - Hot-standby (LACP only)
R - Layer3
S - Layer2
U - in use
f - failed to allocate aggregator
M - not in use, minimum links not met
u - unsuitable for bundling
w - waiting to be aggregated
d - default port

Number of channel-groups in use: 1  
Number of aggregators:           1    

Group   Port-channel  Protocol    Ports  
            Po1        LACP      Gi1/0/21(P)   Gi1/0/22(P)