HP Brocade 4Gb SAN Switch for HP BladeSystem p-Class - Manual (Page 204)

204 Configuring the PID format
Summary of PID formats
HP StorageWorks switches employ these types of PID formats:
• VC encoded
This is the format defined by the Fibre Channel Storage Switch 8 and Fibre Channel Storage Switch
16. Connections to these switches are not supported in Fabric OS v4.0.0 and later.
• native
Introduced with the HP StorageWorks 1 GB switches, this format supports up to 16 ports per switch.
• core
The default for HP StorageWorks SAN Switch 2/8V, SAN Switch 2/16V, SAN Switch 2/32, SAN
Switch 4/32, Core Switch 2/64, and SAN Director 2/128, this is the recommended format for HP
StorageWorks switches and fabrics. It uses the entire 8-bit address space and directly uses the port
number as the area_ID. It supports up to 256 ports per switch.
• extended edge
This format generates the same PID for a port on switches with 16 ports or less as would native PID
format, but it also supports up to 128 ports per domain. It should be used only in cases where you
cannot upgrade devices to dynamic PID binding and you absolutely cannot reboot your servers.
Extended edge PID is supported in Fabric OS v2.6.2 and later, v3.1.2 and later, and v4.2.0 and
later.
In addition to the PID formats list here, Interoperability mode supports additional PID formats that are not
discussed in this guide.
Impact of changing the fabric PID format
If your fabric contains switches that use Native PID, HP recommends that you change the format to Core
PID before you add the new, higher port count switches and directors. Also, HP recommends that you use
Core PID when upgrading the Fabric OS version on HP StorageWorks 1 GB and 2 GB switches.
Depending on your situation, the PID change may or may not entail fabric downtime:
• If you are running dual-fabrics with multipathing software, you can update one fabric at a time
without disrupting traffic. Move all traffic onto one fabric in the SAN and update the other fabric.
Then move the traffic onto the updated fabric, and update the final fabric.
• Without dual-fabrics, stopping traffic is highly recommended. This is the case for many routine
maintenance situations, so dual-fabrics are always recommended for uptime-sensitive environments. If
your fabric contains devices that employ static PID binding, or you do not have dual-fabrics, you must
schedule downtime for the SAN to change the PID format.
The following sections describe various impacts of PID format changes in greater detail.