[linux-lvm] SAN Storage/mirror/lvm
Thomas Meller
thomas.meller at gmx.net
Thu Aug 12 14:08:15 UTC 2004
Cott Lang wrote:
> On the host, I see 4 SCSI devices, two valid, two invalid - I'm
> guessing this is caused because only one storage processor exports
> a particular LUN, so half the paths are invalid until a storage
> processor fails over.
>
> sdd - SP A Path 1
> sde - SP B Path 1
> sdf - SP A Path 2
> sdg - SP B Path 2
>
> I have a LUN currently on SP B, so I can use md multipath configured
> with /dev/sde and /dev/sdg, and that seems to work.
>
> However, two things:
>
> 1) How do I set this up to handle a failover to SP A?
> 2) Multipath only seems to work in failover mode, is there a way to
> load balance across the two paths?
>
> Anyone have any hints? :)
Hello Cott,
your questions and the phenomena you see are likely to be specific to your hardware. I tried
Emulex and QLogic HBA and found very different behaviour.
Multipathing is handled by the storage systems differently from dumb disks. Load balancing
over several physical paths is therefore a complicated task. Most vendors do not really
support it. Some systems suffer from a Host switching paths. Unless you do not use a
supported (read: expensive) Software you should keep your hands off.
Even failover has a 'mechanical' quality: you can hear the door's angles squiek when it
happens.
I found my clusters diving after teardown of a storage's HBA.
Failover while switching the physical path, i.e. switching the HBA takes at least 45 second
on a (tuned) qlogic. Meanwhile the whole computer freezes. The driver seems to switch off
interrupts or something.
Have fun finding your solution.
Thomas
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