I'm currently managing a cluster of HP G10 servers that are connected to a NIMBLE SAN through Fibre Channel. Right now, we're using vSphere but I'm planning to switch to Proxmox. My approach includes migrating the VMDK files to a separate NAS, converting them to RAW format to make them compatible with Proxmox, and then reconfiguring the NIMBLE SAN for use with Proxmox. However, my experience with SANs is quite limited. Since Proxmox doesn't seem to support Fibre Channel for NIMBLE, I was thinking of setting it up for iSCSI instead. But I'm confused about the best way to connect the NIMBLE storage to the servers. Is it possible to run Fibre directly from the Fibre Channel card to the SAN and map iSCSI, or do I need to connect the SAN to a 10Gb port on our switch for iSCSI? Any advice would be really helpful!
2 Answers
It seems like there might be some confusion about SAN and NAS. Remember, SANs use block-based storage and expose LUNs to your hosts, often through a SAN switch. Each Fibre Channel port has a WWPN which allows it to connect to the SAN. You can't just plug these into normal Ethernet switches; they work on different media. Make sure you set up your network correctly for high availability with separate SAN switches and proper zoning. You might want to set up multipathing in Proxmox, which isn’t preconfigured, but it can be done by installing `multipath-tools`. Just ensure you test everything with non-production LUNs first.
You can't do iSCSI over Fibre Channel since they use different protocols. If you're moving to iSCSI with NIMBLE, you'll need to connect it via switched Ethernet, ensuring you have a 10Gb connection. If your NIMBLE was originally set for Fibre Channel, it likely doesn't have the necessary iSCSI ports, so you might need to upgrade your networking hardware, too. It's best to have at least two ports per controller and host, ideally connecting them across different switches for redundancy. Finally, don't run iSCSI on switches that carry other types of traffic to avoid performance issues.
Thanks for clarifying that, I wasn't sure how the protocols worked!
This is super helpful! Thanks for the setup commands, I’ll definitely give them a try!