Having difficultly understanding the SAN connection 3

[riley3]

We're new at this subject and are having a difficult time understanding server/device connection(s). If we have a Windows 2003 Standard Server and a SAN device, how does all the connections fit?

Does the W2003 server connect directly to the SAN device?

By way of SCSI adapter and some type of connection?

Or fiber?

Or copper?

Can we connect from a switch in the LAN network directly to the SAN device? If so, is that for device management or something else?


I know these questions are entry level but would appreciate and help you can give me.
Riley

 

[riley3]

I need to add a couple more questions I forgot about - If my SAN device has two fiber ports I assume you can attach two servers to it?

If you can, can server one be right next to the SAN device and server 2 two floors down?

Thanks again for any help you may be able to provide
Riley

 

[roycrom]

Hi Riley3,

This really depends on what type/size SAN you will have. Our SAN contains 2 SP's (Service Processors) and is all Fibre Connected via 2 McData switches to provide multiple redundancy. The fibre connect to HBA's (Host Bus Adaptors) on the Servers and the servers then see the SAN Luns as Local Disks. If you have long enough cable then you can connect 2 floors down although I would check the spec and loss of signal of any fibre you use over any longish distance.

In my experience, NAS file servers work over copper and provide Network Drives to Windows servers or NFS shares to *NIX servers. The NAS will present itself to the network as a server containing shares and (on windows) would be connected to using UNC convention. (\\NAS_SERVER\share)

Have a look at these
SAN -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storage_area_network

NAS -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_attached_storage

Hope this helps.

------------------------------------------
Somethings come from nothing, nothing seems to come from somethings - SFA - Guerilla

roycrom

 

[comtec17]

Starting with basic terminology.

SAN = Storage Area Network - This a network much like a WAN or LAN but for Storage Devices. A SAN is the actual cloud that contains the device that is the connection point that enables devices to speak to hosts and vica-versa.

A host is an initiator that uses a Fibre Channel Host Bus Adapter or HBA. The HBA can either connect to the device directly (Point-to-Point) or through a SAN switch (Switched Fabric, either Point to Point or Arbitratred Loop).

A storage device such as a Disk Array, JBOD, or Tape Device is called a target. This can be connected directly into by the host or to a SAN Switch or director.

Fibre Channel encapsulates SCSI.

The make/model of your disk device determines how many hosts can directly connect to storage device.

Depending on the HBA being used, it can be either Copper or Fibre.

The distance limitation when using Fibre Channel is variable. For Multi-Mode fibre channel, the distance is up to 500 meters depending on the fibre cable size. For Single mode fibre channel, you can run up to 10km using Longwave GBIC's.

 

[riley3]

Thanks for the information. This is all starting to come together and the responses have been very helpful.
Riley