D-Link DSN-4200, DSN-2100-10, DSN-4100, DSN-1100-10, DSN-3400-10 User Manual
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D-Link System, Inc.™
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
Rev. A
D-Link Systems, Inc. Page 1
December 2, 2009
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
© 2009 D-Link Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved
DISCLAIMER OF LIABILITY: With respect to documents available from this server, neither DLink Systems, Inc. nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied,
including the warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose, or assumes any
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COPYRIGHT: VMware, ESX Server and Virtual Infrastructure are copyrights of EMC. XStack
Storage is a trademark of D-Link Systems, Inc.. Permission to reproduce may be required.
All other brand or product names are or may be trademarks or service marks, and are used
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Copyright © 2009 D-Link Systems, Inc.™
D-Link Systems, Inc.
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Fountain Valley, CA 92708
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D-Link Systems, Inc. Page 2
December 2, 2009
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
Executive Summary
The xStack Storage Series iSCSI storage arrays from D-Link provide cost-effective, easy-todeploy shared storage solutions for applications like the VMware Infrastructure 3 server
virtualization software. In this document the features and performance of the D-Link xStack
Storage™ Series iSCSI storage arrays along with typical server systems are configured,
instructions for use with VMware are given, and recommendations are made.
Overview
Server virtualization programs such as VMware run best when the datacenter or enterprise is
organized into “farms” of servers that are connected to shared storage. By placing the virtual
machines’ virtual disks on storage area networks accessible to all the virtualized servers, the
virtual machines can be migrated from one server to another within the farm for purposes of load
balancing or failover. VMware Infrastructure 3 uses the VMotion live migration facility in its
Distributed Resource Scheduling feature and provides a High Availability component which
takes advantage of shared storage to quickly boot up a virtual machine on a different ESX server
after the original ESX server fails. Shared storage is key to enabling VMotion because, when a
virtual machine is migrated from one physical server to another, the virtual machine’s virtual disk
doesn’t actually move. Only the virtual disk’s ownership is changed while it continues to reside in
the same place.
The xStack Storage iSCSI storage arrays provide excellent performance, reliability and
functionality and do not require specialized hardware and skills to set up and maintain. The Fibre
Channel storage network starts with the fabric, which involves the use of FC host bus adapters
(HBAs) in each server, connected by fiber cables to one or more FC switches, which in turn can
network multiple storage arrays, each supporting a scalable number of high speed disk
enclosures. An application’s request for an input or output (IO) to storage originates as a SCSI
(Small Computer System Interface) request, is packed into an FC packet by the FC HBA, and
sent down the fiber cable to the FC switch for dispatch to the storage array that contains the
requested data, similar to the way Internet Protocol (IP) packets are sent over Ethernet. For
smaller IT shops or for those that are just starting out in the virtualization arena, an alternate
shared storage paradigm is emerging that employs iSCSI (Internet SCSI) to connect the servers to
the storage. In this case the communication between the server and the data storage uses standard
Ethernet network interface cards (NICs), switches and cables. SCSI IO requests are packed into
standard Internet protocol packets and routed to the iSCSI storage through Ethernet switches and
routers. With iSCSI customers can leverage existing networking expertise and equipment to
simplify their implementation of a storage network. Like Fibre Channel, iSCSI supports blocklevel data transmission for all applications, not just VMware. For security iSCSI provides CHAP
authentication as well as IPSEC encryption.
Servers can communicate with iSCSI storage using two methods. The first involves the use of an
add-in card called an iSCSI hardware initiator or host bus adapter, analogous to the Fibre Channel
HBA, which connects directly to the datacenter’s Ethernet infrastructure. The second does the
iSCSI conversion in software and sends the Ethernet packets through the standard Ethernet NIC.
D-Link Systems, Inc. Page 3
December 2, 2009
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
The xStack Storage Series iSCSI SAN solution is designed for different sized customers and
varying environments and is easy to configure to provide storage to VMware hosts.
This document will describe the xStack Storage Series, document how to configure with
VMware, and then, using a database workload running on two virtual machines to demonstrate
usage.
The configuration shown in this paper represent a single, high-level view of the usage of the
xStack Storage array with a simple virtualization workload running on only 5 disks in each array.
Typical customer use scenarios will employ larger disk arrays supporting a variety of
applications, which may result in varying performance results.
xStack Storage Family
D-Link’s virtualized storage technology is revolutionizing the way small and medium enterprises
will manage their storage. Our virtualized storage pool eliminates the complexities associated
with managing traditional RAID. Best of all, D-Link’s iSCSI storage arrays are affordable.
Provision your storage from a single pool of available storage. There is no need to dedicate drive
groups or entire arrays to RAID types or manage individual LUNS. Wizard driven provisioning is
as simple as selecting a volume size and the appropriate application type from a menu. Seasoned
storage administrators have the option of defining volumes with more granularity if desired. The
advanced intelligence of the system allows for multiple virtual volumes with mixed RAID types
to coexist on the same drives. Each application can have a Quality of Service tailored to the needs
of the specific application. Application aware cache algorithms dynamically adjust to each
application, further optimizing performance. By eliminating RAID groups, volumes can span
across the total quantity of disks in the system, thereby further increasing performance. The
benefits of these features become increasingly critical in mixed workload and virtualized server
environments where multiple application types concurrently access the system resources.
All xStack Storage family models are comprised of these features. And, all targets work with
either VMWare ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5 Server.
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December 2, 2009
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
The D-Link DSN-1100-10 iSCSI SAN
The D-Link DSN-2100-10 iSCSI SAN
The D-Link DSN-3200-10 & 3400-10 iSCSI SAN
The D-Link DSN-5110-10, & 5210-10 & 5410-10 iSCSI SAN
D-Link Systems, Inc. Page 5
Figure 1: The xStack Storage family
December 2, 2009
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
VMware and iSCSI
This section will describe the steps needed to attach iSCSI storage to a VMware ESX server host.
Once attached and formatted, the storage can be provided to guest virtual machines as virtual
disks that appear as local storage to the guest. An alternate method, in which the guest is attached
directly to iSCSI storage through a software iSCSI initiator supplied with the guest’s operating
system, is not covered in this document.
ESX 3.0.2 Configuration
Connectivity from a host running VMware’s ESX server to iSCSI storage is provided through a
built-in software initiator (support for hardware iSCSI initiators will be provided at a later date).
The physical network interface cards (NICs) that connect to the Ethernet network in which the
iSCSI storage is located must be included within a VMware virtual switch that also includes the
ESX Service Console and the VMkernel (which supports VMotion traffic as well as iSCSI
packets). For a two-NIC system it is recommended that the NICs be teamed as shown in Figure 2.
This provides NIC/cable failover and iSCSI traffic load balancing across the NICs to multiple
iSCSI targets with different IP addresses.
Since the VM and iSCSI traffic are mixed in this configuration, CHAP authentication and IPSEC
encryption should be employed in the iSCSI connection. (Alternately, in a two- NIC
configuration the VM and iSCSI traffic can be each placed on their own non-teamed NICs for
total isolation). The network configuration is created in Virtual Center (VC) using the Virtual
Infrastructure Client. The ESX server to be connected is highlighted, then the Configuration tab is
selected, then Networking.
If there are more than two NICs available in the ESX server host, it is recommended that two
virtual switches be created, one which hosts the Service Console and VMkernel (including iSCSI
and VMotion traffic), and one which is dedicated to virtual machine (VM) traffic. The two NICs
carrying iSCSI traffic should be cabled to redundant Ethernet switches. An example for four
NICs showing two 2-NIC teams is shown in Figure 3.
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December 2, 2009
xStack Storage DSN-Series SAN Arrays
VMware ESX 3.0.2 & 3.5
Figure 2: ESX Two NIC Configuration for iSCSI
Figure 3: ESX Four NIC Configuration for iSCSI
D-Link Systems, Inc. Page 7
December 2, 2009
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