FibreChannel Stuff

Wed Sep 21 10:59:47 PDT 2005

Hello,

This is a sufficiently different question from my last question that I
figured I'd send a new  thread out. :)

WHAT'S WITH FIBRECHANNEL?  My understanding is its basically another
generation of SCSI, with a more complicated set of connectors.  But
whenever I look at a disk appliance, there's a list, usually a very very
very very very short list of supported HBAs.

For example, if I want an Apple Xserve RAID, the supported non-Mac HBA
is the LSI7202XP.  Okay ... well, what if my server OS doesn't have a
driver for the HBA?  Can I try a different HBA?  Isn't the point of
FC to be a standard to connect bits of hardware together and have them
interoperate?  So, does an "unsupported" HBA just not work?  Or is
"supported" merely a means of saying "yes, we have tested it to some
degree, and maybe got some money from our partner, and bless this one
HBA?"

IF I have the temerity to use a non-"supported" HBA ... do things
usually still work?  Or is FC some delicate twitchy thing where if I
can only reliably connect bits together only after the hardware vendors
have collud^H^Haborated sufficiently to work out all the subtle little
bugs in the FC standards that only creep out under high loads, or such?

Lastly, are there any FreeBSD admins on here who use FC HBAs in a
production environment, and could vouch for or reccoment particular
solutions?

Thanks again.

Sincerely,
-danny

-- 
http://dannyman.toldme.com/