Written by The following was just a short note I wrote in an internal discussion about FCoE vs. iSCSI vs. NFS – and spurred by Tony Bourke’s discussion about methods for implementing FCoE. This wasn’t intended to be a detailed analysis, just a couple of random musings. Comments as always are welcome. —– While NFS and iSCSI [...]
READ MORE »Why do I need an active uplink to use an appliance port?
Reader Peter sent the following question as a comment to my Direct Attach Appliance Ports post. When I connected my NAS to use the appliance port, in order for the vnic of the blade server to communicate with the NAS, i found that there should be a connected uplink port in the 6100 even though [...]
READ MORE »Update on the 8Gb FC vs. 10Gb FCoE Discussion
By far, the most popular post on this blog has been my discussion on the various protocol efficiencies between native 8 Gb/s Fibre Channel and 10 Gb/s Ethernet using Fibre Channel over Ethernet encapsulation. I wrote the original post as much as an exercise in the logic as it was an attempt to educate. I [...]
READ MORE »UCSM 1.4 : Maintenance Policies and Schedules
Strange as it may seem with all of the great new features in UCSM 1.4, this is one of my favorites. To understand the impact, first look at the way disruptive changes were handled prior to this release. When changing a configuration setting on a service profile, updating service profile template, or many policies, if [...]
READ MORE »Small bugfix in UCSM 1.4(1j)
After upgrading one of my lab systems to 1.4(1i) (released December 20, 2010), all of the fans in my chassis showed as failed. Since each fan module contains two separately monitored fans, this resulted in 24 total warnings in my system (8 x fan module, 16 x fans) – annoying, but cosmetic only. UCSM 1.4(1j) [...]
READ MORE »UCSM 1.4 : Where to find firmware now
Prior to UCSM 1.4, all UCS firmware was delivered as a single bundle – this included UCSM itself, the code for the Fabric Interconnects, IO Modules, blades, mezzanine cards, etc. With UCSM 1.4, code is now delivered in three different packages. This makes it easier for Cisco to release support for new blades, mezzanine cards, [...]
READ MORE »UCSM 1.4 : Direct upload of firmware bundles
Ok, so this one isn’t earth-shattering, but I thought it was worth mentioning. Previous to UCSM 1.4, the only way to transfer bundles of firmware to UCSM was via an external server – FTP, TFTP, SCP, or SFTP. In most shops, this isn’t a big deal – you likely already have a utility server of [...]
READ MORE »UCSM 1.4 : Direct attach appliance/storage ports!
One of the most often requested features in the early days of UCS was the ability to directly attach 10GE storage devices (both Ethernet and FCoE based) to the UCS Fabric Interconnects. Up until UCSM 1.4, only two types of Ethernet port configurations existed in UCS – Server Ports (those connected to IO Modules in [...]
READ MORE »What’s cool in UCSM 1.4?
Since so many other great bloggers announced earlier this month that Cisco had released UCS Manager 1.4 (codenamed ‘Balboa’), I didn’t see any reason to wade into the fray with yet another summary of the release notes. For one such excellent summary, see Steve Chamber’s post here: http://viewyonder.com/2010/12/20/ciscoucs-1-4-is-here/ Instead I thought it might be useful, [...]
READ MORE »Why doesn’t Cisco…?
I get asked a lot why Cisco doesn’t have feature X, or support hardware Y in their UCS product line. A recent discussion with a coworker reminded me that lots of those questions are out there, so I might as well give my opinion on them. Disclaimer : I don’t work for Cisco, I don’t [...]
READ MORE »Placement of mezzanine adapters in full width blades
During a discussion recently with some other UCS-savvy folks, I realized that there may be some confusion in how to place mezzanine adapters in full width blades when you’re only using one adapter. First, a quick review of how UCS pins mezzanine ports to uplinks. I’ll skip the one uplink option, since all ports [...]
READ MORE »Chassis Discovery Policies in UCS
Cisco UCS provides a configurable “Chassis Discovery Policy” that affects how chassis links (called “Server Ports”) are activated when discovering a new chassis. See this page on cisco.com. After a recent discussion on Twitter, I decided to test out a few scenarios. My configuration is a pair of UCS 6120 Fabric Interconnects, two UCS 5108 [...]
READ MORE »The Problem With Vendor Sponsored Testing
I suppose this post has been a long time coming. It was spurred into reality by an exchange with @bladeguy who pointed out that Cisco, too, sponsors tests of their equipment – just like HP and the Tolly reports. At first, I’d intended to do a comparison of the Tolly reports and the Principled Technologies [...]
READ MORE »Private Isolated VSANs?
Ok, so this isn’t really UCS related. Just a random thought I had today while working on a lab project… why don’t we have Private VSANs? As in, the same type of technology as Private VLANs (PVLANs)? First, some background. Standard SAN best practice for access control is to use single-initiator/single-target zoning. This means that [...]
READ MORE »UCSM 1.3(1c) Released!
Cisco has released UCS Manager version 1.3(1c). This is the first public release in the 1.3 line, also known as “Aptos+”. Release notes are here: http://www.cisco.com/en/US/docs/unified_computing/ucs/release/notes/ucs_22863.html Haven’t gotten a chance to play with the new version yet, but there are some significant enhancements. Among them… 1 GE support on UCS6120 and UCS6140 Fabric Interconnects On [...]
READ MORE »Correction to L2 Forwarding Rules post
I posted here about the L2 forwarding rules when UCS is in EHV mode. Several readers have pointed out a flaw in the logic I posted, which was taken from Cisco’s DCUCI course. In Cisco’s defense, I did write that course. :) At issue is how UCS deals with unknown unicast frames. [...]
READ MORE »Cisco Press book on UCS now shipping!
Got notification today from Amazon that the new Cisco Press book on UCS by Silvano Gai, Tommy Salli, and Richard Andersson is now shipping. Take a look, it’s in my UCS Bookstore.
READ MORE »Great UCS write-up by Joe Onisick
If you’re not currently following Joe’s blog over at definethecloud.wordpress.com, you should start. He just posted another great article on why UCS is his server platform of choice. Before you write him off as just another Cisco fan-boy, definitely take a look at his logic. Even if you have another vendor preference, he presents some [...]
READ MORE »UCS with disjointed L2 Domains
How do we deal with disjointed L2 domains in UCS? To start, what’s a disjointed L2 domain? This is where you have two Ethernet “clouds” that never connect, but must be accessed by the same UCS Fabric Interconnect. Take, for example, a multi-tenant scenario where we have multiple customer’s servers within the same UCS [...]
READ MORE »UCS Bookstore
Since my previous announcements about various books on UCS and related topics have gotten rolled off the main page, I thought it would be useful to collect them into a bookstore. I’ve added a link (see the navigation tabs at the top of the screen) to my UCS Bookstore. Feel free to have [...]
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