A quick introduction to SANs and Panasas ActivStor

Kevin Haines, eScience Centre, STFC, RAL

WikiPedia defines a SAN:

A storage area network (SAN) is an
architecture to attach remote
computer storage devices (such as
disk arrays, tape libraries, and optical
jukeboxes) to servers in such a way
that the devices appear as locally
attached to the operating system.

SAN Topology
Its like a LAN...
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Storag
e2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch

SAN Topology
Its like a LAN... it has a switch...
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Storag
e2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch

SAN Topology
Its like a LAN... it has a switch, and network cards.
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Storag
e2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch

SAN Topology
Its like a LAN... it has a switch, and network cards.
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Storag
e2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch

SAN Topology
Its like a LAN...but a little different.

Host/HBA
1

Fibre Connectors 2/4/8Gb/s

Storag
e1

Host/HBA
2

Storag
e2

Host/HBA
3
Initiators

SAN Switch
WWNs

Targets

Controlling Access
Zoning implemented by the switch
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Storag
e2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch
Zone 1 = HBA1 + Storage1
Zone 2 = HBA2 + HBA3 +
Storage 2

Controlling Access
LUN masking on the storage array
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch
Zone 1 = HBA1 + Storage1
Zone 2 = HBA2 + HBA3 +
Storage 2

LD1

HBA2

LD2

HBA2

LD3

HBA3

Controlling Access
LUN masking on the storage array
Host/HBA
1
Storag
e1
Host/HBA
2

Host/HBA
3
SAN Switch
Zone 1 = HBA1 + Storage1
Zone 2 = HBA2 + HBA3 +
Storage 2

LD1

HBA2

LD2

HBA2

LD3

HBA3

Increasing Resilience
Multipath

HBA 1

SAN Switch 1
Storag
e1

HOST
HBA 2

SAN Switch 2

Questions about SANs?

Panasas ActivStor

Panasas ActivStor

Panasas ActivStor

Director Blades
Meta-data and volume management services
NFS access gateway

Panasas ActivStor

Storage Blades
Two disks (up to 2TB per blade)
2xGb/s ethernet (failover mode)
11 per shelf (must be managed by DB)

Panasas ActivStor
Resilience

Data is striped across all Storage Blades (RAID5 or RAID1)

One or more Storage Blades worth of space reserved for failures
System monitoring for pre-emptive actions (Blade Drain)
Two or more Director Blades can provide failover for each other

Panasas ActivStor
Performance
DirectFLOW clients
Available for most major Linux

distributions
Directly communicates with Storage
Blades
RAID computations performed by client
~5000 supported (12000 option)

Panasas ActivStor
Performance
DirectFLOW clients
Available for most major Linux distributions
Directly communicates with Storage

Blades
RAID computations performed by client
~5000 supported (12000 option)

Results show scalable claim is true

RAL: 1.2 GB/s from 22 nodes (2 shelves)
RoadRunner: 60GB/s (103 shelves)