Chapter 2 — Architecture Overview High-Availability Configurations
December 2019 User Guide—Spectra T200, T380, and T680 Libraries
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HIGH-AVAILABILITY CONFIGURATIONS
In high-availability enterprise environments, keeping the library operating
even in the event of a network connection failure or component failure is
extremely important. The following sections describe the high-availability
features of the library.
Redundant Connectivity
In a high-availability Fibre Channel environment, the ability to maintain
communications between the host systems and the library and its drives in
the event of a connection failure is essential.
The library can be configured to use two controllers (RIMs or F-QIPs)
and the BlueScale Controller Failover feature to provide redundant
connectivity to the media changer functionality of the library. See
Configure Controller Failover on page 127 for information about
configuring controller failover.
The servers and Fibre Channel switches used to access the direct-
attached LTO-4 or later generation Fibre Channel drives in the library
can use failover software to provide redundant connectivity through
the two Fibre Channel ports on each drive.
The controllers must be running the same firmware version. If you install the
second controller after you update the BlueScale software, the BlueScale versions
for the two controllers may be different. Update the BlueScale software as
described in Updating the BlueScale Software and Library Firmware on page 441 to
correct the reported firmware mismatch.
Drives used to provide the robotic control path cannot be configured with
controller failover, however, if you are using LTO-5 and later generation tape drives,
you can export the same changer interface over multiple drives in the partition to
provide redundancy as long as your software can support this. These multiple
paths cannot be used at the same time. Assigning multiple drive exporters to one
partition reduces the total number of partitions that can be configured in the
library.
Controller failover is not supported on 4 GB Fibre Channel F-QIPs. If you have 4 GB
Fibre Channel F-QIPs, the Failover button does not display on the Controllers
screen.
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