HP Storage Forum for technical questions

[#1]

By Calvin Zito

I thought many of you would find it helpful to know about (or be reminded of) our HP IT Resource Center (IT RC) Forum.  It's a sort of "Yahoo Answers" community for HP technology.  There is a specific storage category that you can find and either ask, answer, or read questions and answers.  You can find it at http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/familyhome.do?familyId=120. The home page for the IT RC Forum is http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/home.do?forumId=1. 

JULY 2011 UPDATE:

The old ITRC site was migrated to a new platform and the URL's have changed.  Here's where you can find the storage section: http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/Storage/ct-p/itrc-120.  Here's also a link to the home page for the new community - called the Enterprise Business Community: http://h30499.www3.hp.com/

In addition to storage, some of the topics covered include servers, OS's (HP-UX, Microsoft, Linux, MPE/ix, OpenVMS, Tru64 UNIX) networking, SOA, digital imaging, printers, print servers, and more.

I think you'll find this a very useful site to get technical questions answered.

Calvin

[#2]

What does HP have or will soon have that will work like or as "VMware vCenter Site Recovery Manager" on EVA 8100 running current code load?

[#3]

Hi  - the EVA has supported Site Recovery Manager for almost a year now.  There was a blog post about it that you can find here: www.communities.hp.com/.../HPPost5934.aspx.  You'll see in the comments a couple of URL's where you can download the EVA software for SRM which is h20000.www2.hp.com/.../ProductList.jsp

Thanks for asking!

[#4]

Hi - Yes we support SRM on both EVA and XP.  HP also has a product that integrates with Microsofts Cluster Server called CLX (Cluster Extension) which allows a cluster to failover similar to SRM.  CLX also supports Linux with ServiceGuard.  On the HP-UX product line there is a product called Metro-cluster that works with Service Guard.

The biggest difference between SRM and these Cluster products integrated with CLX is that SRM is a manual failover while the cluster products is an automated failover.  This allows the clusters to failover without an administrator initiating the failover.  This would be quite useful in the middle of the night, weekend or holiday.  It minimizes downtime and reduces costs.

[#5]

Hi,

We are working on HP EVA 4400 model and need to configure the vdisks.May I know the HP best practices for creating disk groups - with max efficeincy, vraid type and standard size including parity and hot spares.?

Please send your reply to murali.k.bhandekar@accenture.com also ( if any)

Thanks,

B M Krishna

[#6]

Hi B M,

I'm not a storage architect so can't answer your question.  I also would have a hard time getting an answer for you without more detail of what you're trying to do in your environment.  I can tell you that what I hear the EVA team saying time and again is that the less disk groups, the better.  That said, here are a couple of things:

• I'd suggest asking your question on the ITRC.  Obviously you found this blog post where I talked about the ITRC - just use the URL in the post to go to the ITRC and ask your question there.  You'll probably be asked to provide more specifics about what you're trying to do.


• Here’s a link to a recent EVA best practices white paper: h20195.www2.hp.com/.../4AA2-0914ENW.pdf.  Just looking at the table of contents, the paper makes my point about trying to give you the right answer – the number of disk groups you configure really depends on how you’d prioritize availability, cost, and performance.  Take a look at the paper and hopefully it will help better guide you in the decision.  I see that my previous comment about as few disk groups as possible is stated on page 4 of the white paper.

All the best, Calvin

[#7]

Hi everyone,

I have been working on EMC Clariion storage boxes for many years now. Now i have switched my job and here i will be handling HP storage  boxes. I was trying to get some hardware configuration of the HP boxes, but could not find it anywhere? Can any of you help me with this? May be email a document or something like that.. Also, what is the difference between HP Storage Works and HP EVA boxes. My knowledge in HP storage is very limited (which you can make out from teh above questions) however any doubt in EMC storage and i am there to help yuo!!!

[#8]

Hi Chris,

Feel free to send me an email and I'll help you out.  Click on the "Contact" link on the top right side of the page or send to me at calvinDOTzito at hp.com (no spaces and replace the word "DOT" with a ".").

Thanks, Calvin

[#9]

Waht are the differences between Disk Adapter Set Pairs  which we use in XP24000 & Array Control Processor in XP1024

[#10]

Hi,

We have HP4500, 28.28 TB Multisite SAN.

In the MultiSAN site we have 7 node connected to Each Datacenter .

Please provide any suggestion implementing Fail Over Manager  on Hyper-V Enviornment.

[#11]

@Rakeshnannapaneni - I'd suggest you ask that question on the ITRC forums.  The blog isn't the best place to answer those kinds of questions because I don't have enough experience with our broad range of products in all the possible environments.  That said, here are a few things that might help:

>  BladeSystem and P4000 Reference Architecture w/ Hyper-V

> Building high performance, high availability IP SANs with HP LeftHand

> www.hp.com/go/P4000Support Great resource for all things P4000

If I find anything else, I'll let you know.

[#12]

@Rakeshnannapaneni - Just got this after leaving the last comment:  Documentation was not updated to include instructions for Hyper-V version of FOM. But good news is that the team made it easier to install vs the ESX version. Basically you just need to follow the install wizard. Note: you need to have an equal number of nodes at the two sites; you'll want to use the synthetic NIC and will probably have to install some hot fixes.
 
Here's a link to the P4000 user guide. 

Hope that all helps...

[#13]

hi,

I've just come across the d2d range, and wondered if there's any plans for one based on blades, rather the proliant form factors? I'd like to try and get it all inside a c3000? Perhaps based on the storage blade?

Alternatively, could the added value software part of the d2d be packaged out as a virtual appliance, rather like the p4000 vsa ia to the p4000, so that we could run it as a VM on the blades inside our c3000, without the need for an extra box?

[#14]

Hi Richard,

I don't know specifically if we'll have the D2D running on blades but its certainly possible - that's exactly what we did the the P4000 LeftHand product - and that running on BladeSystem is the P4800. 

When we announced HP StoreOnce last summer, we talked about a light version that would run on a VM as a lightweight backup target.  I can't give specifics about futures but stay tuned - the StoreOnce roadmap is pretty bright!

[#15]

Hi,

We have HP lefthand P4500 storage and have 3 LUNs,On the other hand we have 3 blade servers and Win Server 2008 R2 is running each of them.Also Hyper-V role enabled.

LUN1 has assigned blade1

LUN2 has assigned blade2

LUN3 has assigned blade3

after blade firmware updates LUN1 has seen RAW file format from blade1.

Blade models:BL460c G6

Storage models:HP P4500

Opr Systemserver 2008 R2

Virtulazition Systems:Hyper-V

How to change RAW to NTFS again...

Thanks

[#16]

Hi Muarater85 - I'm not a technical expert and not really the person that can help answer questions like this.  I'd suggest you visit the new Enterprise Business Community site.  Here's a link to the storage discussions happening there - notice there's an area to ask and talk about the P4000.  Please ask your question there.  Thanks!

[#17]

Hi:

I have a cuestion, i can use a "HP StorageWorks M5314C FC Drive Enclosure - storage enclosure" without a HSVxx00 (HSV Controller)??

I only need 1.5 TB on HD my M5314C have it, but i have this cuestion.

I don't need high availability, I can manage my disks without HVS controller?

I need administrate only this Enclosure.

[#18]

@anarmas - I don't believe there's a way to use a shelf other than the one that comes with an EVA or that are purchased as add-on shelves for the particular version of EVA that you're trying to add to. There may be an unsupported way to cobble it together - that would be an ideal question for the support forum.  But be forwarned - it probably isn't something HP would support.

[#19]

@anarmas - I stand corrected.  This might be supported.  The enclosure you mentioned is supported with EVA 4100, 4400, 6100, and 8100.  You can get more details on this hp.com specs page for the enclosure.

[#20]

Hi,

I'm configuring HP Storage P2000 G3 MSA, I have configured visks, and volumes, and added to host through FC cables, but what I have noticed is that it shows a single volume 2 times, as 2 different disks, same size. In addition it shows 2 different discovered volumes which you cannot bring online, or initialize because they don't exist configured in the storage server. How I can remove them, and fix volumes to be shown twice. This storage has 2 controllers, and all hosts are connected with FS.

[#21]

alfa2100 - the blog is really the wrong place to get questions like your addressed.  You should ask it on the Community Support Forum: http://h30499.www3.hp.com/t5/Storage/ct-p/itrc-120 

[#22]

hi

i have just joined the HP online form.

it has asked me to logon with my user id, which is no prob. BUT then it asks for "Word verification by reCAPTCHA"

what the hell is this????????

[#23]

how to shutdown HP Storageworks HSV300?