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A storage area network (SAN) is a dedicated, centrally managed, secure information infrastructure, which enables any-to-any interconnection of servers and storage systems. Storage architectures such as the DS8000 series or IBM® System Storage® Ultrium (LTO) and IBM Enterprise Tape Libraries can be connected directly to the Power system through fibre channel adapters, or through a SAN fabric.
POWER6 and IBM i 6.1 (i5/OS V6R1) brings several enhancements to SAN attach:
- Smart IOAs (do not require an IOP).
- New Fibre Channel Controllers 5749, 5774 and 5735 have two ports. (#5749 is also supported on POWER5 systems as of 5/2009. Boot support, via #5749 is not supported on POWER5).
- The number of LUNs (Logical Unit Number) per port for disk attach is doubled to 64.
- Imbedded hardware enhancements in the new controllers improves performance.
- POWER6 and IBM i 6.1 support IBM i running as a client of the Virtual I/O server (VIOS). With this capability the following IBM storage devices are supported by IBM i through VIOS.
- For details on the attachment and use of these devices with VIOS refer to: Open Storage Read Me (PDF, 772KB). Blades customers should refer to: IBM i on POWER Blades Supported Environments Read-me First (PDF, 160KB)
- For more information on attaching these mid-range storage offerings to IBM i refer to : Midrange storage on IBM i Redbook.
- With IBM i 6.1.1 software DS5100 and DS5300 can be directly attached (no VIOS required).
- DS8000 can be attached directly or through VIOS for those who desire to take advantage of virtual Storage capabilities with DS8000. Please note that the copy services options for DS8000 work differently when attached through VIOS. For more information please refer to the Open Storage Read Me document (PDF, 772KB).
- Check out SAN Support with IBM i for additional information on the various connectivity options, SAN fabric support, and information about fibre channel adapters.
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