iSCSI testing using SNS GlobalSAN Initiator

Storage & Archiving

iSCSI testing using SNS GlobalSAN Initiator

Posted by Robert Root on April 15, 2011 at 10:55 am

Hello all,

Advanced warning, this is my first foray into iSCSI… I hope this is the right forum for this also.

I am doing some testing using iSCSI to see about investing in some dedicated SAN servers for our Video Editing dept.

For this testing, I have a Mac Pro (Dual Quad 2.26 Nehlehem 10.6.7) and an IBM X3400 server with OpenSuse 11.3 installed. I used vgcreate to make the volume group and then lvcreate to create the logical volume (40GB). This is on the boot drive, BTW, which is a 15k RPM IBM SAS drive.

With the lvs command this comes:

linux-wcp7:/home/x3400 # lvs
LV VG Attr LSize Origin Snap% Move Log Copy% Convert
iscsi vg00 -wi— 40.00g

So it seems the disk space is correctly set up. So now, I go to the Mac and start the GLobalSAN initiator and connect. I am connecting successfully, but I am not seeing the disk appear.

I was under the impression that when you connect it will come up with a small window telling that a new disk is detected and that it needs to be initialized. Then you format it through OSx Disk Utility just like any other new physically attached drive. However no window comes and a new drive is not showing in Disk Utility.

Can anyone say what I am doing wrong?

Is it proper to use disk space on the boot drive, or is this a possible issue?

Robert

Sebastien Bertrand replied 15 years, 1 month ago 5 Members · 5 Replies
5 Replies

Bob Zelin
April 15, 2011 at 1:29 pm

It’s going to kill you to buy a Studio Network Solutions SAN system, isn’t it ?

Bob Zelin
Chris Gordon
April 16, 2011 at 3:01 am

Did you install, configure and start the iSCSI target software on your Linux server?
Caspian Brand
April 18, 2011 at 9:37 pm

Cheers Bob!

-Caspian
Studio Network Solutions
Caspian Brand
April 18, 2011 at 9:43 pm

Robert,

While you might do alright with this approach for testing connectivity, I would not recommend using the boot drive of your target server to share out space to other users, for the same reasons we tend to recommend people not record or edit audio and video on their OS drives.

The best place to find info on our globalSAN iSCSI Initiator is our own forum:

https://www.snsforums.com/index.php?showforum=14&s=b0dfffdb7e0bc8a6604b1b7cda38f8d6

And the best place to read more about our own Linux based storage server, specifically tuned for Audio & Video prodction is here:

https://www.studionetworksolutions.com/products/product_detail.php?pi=12

We announced new configuration options at NAB, including the ability to configure an all Ethernet based EVO solution.

Best Regards,
-Caspian
Studio Network Solutions
Sebastien Bertrand
April 19, 2011 at 3:46 pm

The iSCSI target on the linux side has nothing to do with configuring LVM or creating volume groups (although you might want to use that to prepare your storage first, creating a LV will not make it a iSCSI target).

A typical test setup would be:

Install the system on one drive
Add a second hard drive (or raid array, etc)
Configure iet to make that second drive a target.
Start the iet service

I suggest you visit https://iscsitarget.sourceforge.net and have a look at the wiki

Cheers,

Sebastien Bertrand
Ordigraphe Inc.
https://www.ordigraphe.com

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