Hitachi Universal Storage Platform VM - Manual (Page 81)

Functional and Operational Characteristics 3-37
Hitachi Universal Storage Platform V/VM User and Reference Guide
Open-Systems Operations
Open-Systems Compatibility and Functionality
The Universal Storage Platform V/VM supports and offers many features and
functions for the open-systems environment, including:
• Multi-initiator I/O configurations in which multiple host systems are
attached to the same fibre-channel interface
• Fibre-channel arbitrated-loop (FC-AL) and fabric topologies
• Command tag queuing
• Industry-standard failover and logical volume management software
• SNMP remote storage system management
The Universal Storage Platform V/VM’s global cache enables any fibre-channel
port to have access to any LU in the storage system. In the USP V/VM, each
LU can be assigned to multiple fibre-channel ports to provide I/O path failover
and/or load balancing (with the appropriate middleware support, such as
HGLAM) without sacrificing cache coherency.
The user should plan for path failover (alternate pathing) to ensure the highest
data availability. The LUs can be mapped for access from multiple ports and/or
multiple target IDs. The number of connected hosts is limited only by the
number of FC ports installed and the requirement for alternate pathing within
each host. If possible, the primary path and alternate path(s) should be
attached to different channel cards.