HP FlexFabric 5900CP Series User manual

HP FlexFabric 5900CP Solutions
Configuration Guide
Abstract
This document describes HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch usage in converged Ethernet and storage network configurations. It
provides information about switch features and storage configurations, including the device support.
HP Part Number: 5697-3065
Published: March 2014
Edition: 1

© Copyright 2014, Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
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The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express
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not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein.

Contents
1 HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch overview.........................................................4
Features and benefits................................................................................................................4
HP FlexFabric 5900CP network architectures................................................................................5
2 Port types and switch modes........................................................................6
Port types................................................................................................................................6
Switch modes...........................................................................................................................6
3 Storage use-cases.......................................................................................8
4 IRF usage with storage..............................................................................14
5 c-Class BladeSystem interconnects...............................................................17
6 HP FlexFabric 5900CP Storage Network Support.........................................18
HP FlexFabric 5900CP Operating System Support with Storage....................................................18
HP FlexFabric 5900CP CNA/HBA Support................................................................................18
HP FlexFabric NPV Switch Support............................................................................................19
HP FlexFabric HP Storage System Support..................................................................................19
7 Software and Firmware update process (Non-ISSU and ISSU).........................20
8 Management Software..............................................................................21
Using the CLI.........................................................................................................................21
IMC Management software......................................................................................................22
A HP FlexFabric 5900CP system architecture considerations..............................23
B Support information..................................................................................26
C HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch configuration file............................................28
Contents 3

1 HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch overview
The HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch is a ToR (Top of Rack) converged L2/L3 switch with 48 converged
ports and four 40GbE QSFP ports. This switch provides seamless integration of 10GbE networks
into existing server-edge environments, such as FCoE DCB and Fibre Channel. It is a full featured
switch and a software license is not required. When coupled with the HP StoreFabric converged
optical transceiver, it provides wire-once capability for 10GbE/FCoE and 8 Gb or 4 Gb Fibre
Channel.
Figure 1 HP FlexFabric 5900CP front (port) and rear (power) view
The switch is supported as a standard Ethernet switch in HPN Ethernet networks and as a DCB
Ethernet switch for converged environments with Ethernet/FCoE. It provides native Fibre Channel
connectivity and can be used as a gateway to other HP Fibre Channel switch series fabrics using
NPV.
It can be added in an HP 5900 series IRF (Intelligent Resilient Framework) to simplify management
by combining multiple physical switches into one virtual switch. An IRF fabric appears as one node
or virtual switch and is accessible as a single IP address on the network. You can use this IP address
to log in at any member device to manage all the members of the IRF fabric.
Features and benefits
The HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch provides the following features:
•Ethernet/FCoE support on 10GbE converged ports and 40GbE ports
•Fibre Channel 8Gb/4Gb/2Gb support on converged ports
•DCB/FCoE-FCF/NPV/TRILL/IPv6 support (QCN ready)
•Forty-eight converged ports that can use a single transceiver which supports 10GbE/FCoE or
8Gb/4Gb Fibre Channel
•FCoE/FC NPV gateway support
•Dual-hop support with Virtual Connect blade switches and the HP 6125-XLG
•5900 Series IRF support (up to nine switches with Ethernet, two switches with storage)
•iSCSI support
•Front-to-back and back-to-front airflow
•Comware OS version 7.1
•No additional feature licenses. The following four switch modes are available:
Standard—Configurable DCB switch◦
◦FCF—FC/FCoE initiator; storage; FlexFabric SAN switch; F, VF, VE, and E port connectivity
(4K zones); FSPF
4 HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch overview

◦NPV—Gateway for FC/FCoE multi-vendor connectivity
◦Transit—FIP-snooping DCB aggregation switch
•1.28 Tb/s switching capacity
•952.32 Million PPS throughput, integrated 9 MB packet buffer
•10GbE cut-through latency < 1.5 µs (64Byte packets)
•CLI and iMC/VAN/VFM (Intelligent Management Center) fabric management
•HP IIIAS (Intelligent Infrastructure Analyzer Software) support
•L2/L3, IPv4/IPv6 dual stack, TRILL, VEPA
•Cloud and SDN ready (OpenFlow 1.3.1 support)
Figure 2 (page 5) describes the major components and the ports of the HP FlexFabric 5900CP
switch. The front view shows 48 converged ports, which can be configured as 1 or 10GbE, or 8,
4 or 2 Gb Fibre Channel. The four 40GbE ports can be configured as four individual 40GbE
ports, or 16 10GbE ports when used with a splitter cable.
The switch supports two pluggable fan trays and two AC power supplies for redundancy. Two
options are available for fan trays, front-to-back airflow or back-to-front airflow.
Figure 2 HP FlexFabric 5900CP components and ports
HP FlexFabric 5900CP network architectures
The HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch can be utilized in the following environments:
•A traditional Ethernet network for Ethernet data
•A converged network switch in environments that support Ethernet and FCoE for Ethernet and
storage data
•A native Fibre Channel fabric switch for storage data
In a converged environment, the HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch is configured as a ToR switch
connecting to a LAN and a SAN.
LAN connectivity is made through any of the 48 converged ports configured as 10GbE ports or
the 40GbE ports for a total of up to 64 10GbE ports.
SAN connectivity is made through any of the 48 converged ports configured as 10GbE/FCoE
ports or configured as 8/4/2 Gb Fibre Channel ports. When configured as Fibre Channel ports,
the converged ports support device connectivity (F_Port) or switch connectivity via NPV (NP_Ports)
to other HP Fibre Channel switches that support NPIV.
HP FlexFabric 5900CP network architectures 5

2 Port types and switch modes
To support LAN and SAN environments, the HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch utilizes multiple port
types and switch modes.
Port types
The HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch supports multiple port types. Table 1 (page 6) lists the port
types supported.
Table 1 Supported HP FlexFabric 5900CP port types
Ethernet Port Types
•Access/Tagged-trunk 10GbE/40GbE ports used for Ethernet data
FCoE Port Types
•VF_Port: Virtual F_Port (FCoE switch to FCoE target/initiator)
•VE_Port: Virtual E_Port (FCoE switch to FCoE switch) (future use-case support)
•VNP_Port: FCoE NPV switch port (FCoE switch to FCoE switch as a proxy)
FC Port Types
•F_Port: Fabric port (switch to FC target/initiator)
•E_Port: Expansion port (switch to switch ISL) (future use-case support)
•NP_Port: NPV switch port (FC switch to FC switch as a proxy)
Switch modes
The HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch supports four operating modes. Standard mode is the default
mode. FCF, NPV, and Transit modes are advanced modes.
1. Standard (Non-FCoE) Mode—When a switch operates in this mode, it is a standard/DCB
Ethernet switch and does not provide any FCoE/FC capabilities.
2. FCF (Fibre Channel Forwarder)—When a switch operates in this mode, it is called as an FCF
switch. In this mode, the following HP FlexFabric 5900CP converged port connections are
available:
Fibre Channel
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP F_Port to an N_Port on a node.
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP (NPIV) F_Port to an NP_Port on an NPV switch.
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP E_Port to an E_Port on another HP FlexFabric 5900CP FCF switch.
FCoE
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP VF_Port to a VN_Port on a node.
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP (NPIV) VF_Port to a VNP_Port on an NPV switch.
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP VE_Port to the VE_Port on another HP FlexFabric 5900CP FCF
switch.
If the primary mode of the HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch is set to FCF, the converged ports
can be set to F_Port or E_Port, but cannot be set to NP_Port. For FCoE, the ports can be set
to VF_Port or VE_Port, but cannot be set to VNP_Port.
NOTE: At present, no E_Port connectivity use-cases are supported.
6 Port types and switch modes

3. NPV/Gateway Mode—When a switch operates in this mode, it is called as an NPV (N_Port
Virtualizer) switch. In this mode, the following HP FlexFabric 5900CP converged port
connections are available:
Fibre Channel
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP F_Port to an N_Port on a node.
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP NP_Port to an F_Port on an FCF (NPIV) switch.
FCoE
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP VF_Port to a VN_Port on a node.
•HP FlexFabric 5900CP VNP_Port to a VF_Port on an FCF (NPIV) switch.
If the primary mode of the HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch is set to NPV, the converged ports
can be set to F_Port or NP_Port, but cannot be set to E_Port. For FCoE, the ports can be set
to VF_Port or VNP_Port, but cannot be set to VE_Port.
4. Transit Mode—When a switch operates in this mode, it is called as a Transit switch. A switch
operating in this mode can restrict its Ethernet interface only to receiving traffic from an eNode
or FCF switch. This is achieved by configuring the interface to operate in eNode mode or FCF
mode. Fibre Channel is not supported in this mode. When a switch is configured in Transit
mode, it always enables FIP snooping. VF_Port traffic is allowed. However, VE_Port traffic is
blocked.
NOTE: After changing to any one of the advanced modes and saving the configuration,
you must reboot the switch.
<HP>system-working-mode {advance standard}
<HP>fcoe-mode {fcf npv transit}
[confirmation]
[mode changed]
<HP>Save
<HP>reboot
Switch modes 7

3 Storage use-cases
The HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch supports several converged Ethernet/FCoE and Fibre Channel
storage configurations. To simplify understanding and implementation of these configurations, a
set of use-case topology designs are defined. The use-cases describe recommended ways to use
the HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch, switch modes, and port types in different server-storage
deployment scenarios. Some of the use-cases show multiple types of connectivity within the same
configuration. This is meant to show the different connection options available. Your design might
use one or more of these options, but not necessarily all as shown.
HP recommends that all storage configurations implement dual-redundant fabrics for high availability.
All HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch use-cases for storage described here implement dual-redundant
fabrics for high availability.
NOTE: The IRF feature of the HP FlexFabric 5900CP switch can be implemented in dual-redundant
fabric designs with storage, but has implications that must be considered. For more information
about using IRF in a storage configuration, see “IRF usage with storage” (page 14)
Figure 3 (page 8) provides three major use-case scenarios, each describing a different
implementation based on the hardware being utilized for servers and storage. All use-cases show
a single layer or single tier of HP FlexFabric 5900CP switches, also referred as East-West fabric
topology, with variations for use-case 2 and use-case 3. Use-case 2 shows dual-hop on the server
side and use-case 3 shows additional fabric connectivity on the storage side to other HP Fibre
Channel/FCoE switch series fabrics via 5900CP NPV gateway mode.
Figure 3 HP FlexFabric 5900CP major use-case scenarios
Table 2 (page 9) describes the HP FlexFabric 5900CP use-cases in detail. The items listed in the
variant column are links to the figures which describe the variant connectivity options in detail.
8 Storage use-cases

Table 2 HP FlexFabric 5900CP use-cases
5900CP
Switch ModeStorage ConnectServer ConnectVariant
Major SAN Fabric
Use-Case
FCFNative FCoERack/CNA1A: Rack Server, FCoE Storage#1 Single-Tier
Fabric, Rack
Servers Native FCRack/CNA/HBA1B: Rack Server, FC Storage
Native FCoEBlade/VC2A: BladeSystem Dual-hop, FCoE Storage#2 Single-Tier
Fabric, Blade
System Native FCBlade/FC2B: BladeSystem FC/FCoE, FC Storage
NPV
Gateway
FC via B/C/H
FC Switch
Rack/CNA/HBA3A: Rack Server, FC NPV Gateway, FC Storage#3 Single-Tier
Fabric, NPV
Gateway Blade/VC3B: BladeSystem, FC NPV Gateway, FC Storage
FC/FCoE via
Cisco Nexus
Rack/CNA/HBA
Blade/VC/FC
3C: Rack/BladeSystem, FCoE NPV Gateway
55xx FCoE
Switch
FCF, NPVNative FCoE,
FC
Rack/CNA/HBA
Blade/VC/FC
Applies to all Use-Cases aboveStorage Fabric
IRF
Configurations
Figure 4 HP FlexFabric 5900CP FCF Use-Case 1A
LAN
FCoE Storage
IRF
IRF*
VF_Port VF_Port
VN_Port
VN_Port
Expand
switches
horizontally
as required 5900CP FCF
FCoE
Converged Ethernet/FCoE
Native Ethernet
FCoE
IRF* between 5900CP’s
(optional)
5900CP1A
Server/CNA
9

Figure 5 HP FlexFabric 5900CP FCF Use-Case 1B
LAN FC Storage
IRF
IRF*
F_Port F_Port
N_Port
N_Port
Expand
switches
horizontally
as required
Server/CNA Server/HBA
5900CP FCF
FCoE/FC
Converged Ethernet/FCoE
Native FC
Native Ethernet
IRF* between 5900CP’s
(optional)
5900CP1b
Figure 6 HP FlexFabric 5900CP FCF Use-Case 2A
FCoE Storage
IRF
IRF*
VF_Port VF_Port
VN_Port
VN_Port
Expand
switches
horizontally
as required 5900CP FCF
FCoE
Converged Ethernet/FCoE
Native Ethernet
FCoE
IRF* between 5900CP’s
(optional)
5900CP2A
LAN
10 Storage use-cases