Shared Storage

[Alex Gerulaitis]

For Windows, Tiger MetaSAN I believe is the best option – check out “Windows OS centric SAN sample configuration”

I also think it’s not married specifically to FC and will work equally well on iSCSI. Hope my friend Bernard Lamborelle, resident Tiger Tech SAN guru, will chip in.

[Nathaniel Cooper]

Hey Glenn,

What are the exact specs on the hardware that you currently have? How are you using that hardware now without management software?

Best,

Nate Cooper
ProMAX
nate.cooper@promax.com

[Glenn Erdos]

I am physically managing the SAN. No two machines can connect to the same drive at ANY time.

Spec? Two Supermicro dual intel dual core with 8+ gigs ram and 8 500 sataII drives in each, raid5, qlogic sanbox 5600, qlogic 2402 fc cards.

The 2 servers are seen by client and raid 0 at client end, resulting a raid50 setup.

Iscsi server is intel server board w/2 quad cores, 16 gigs ram, 4 x 500 sataII raid0,

NAS on same machine as iscsi, 16 x 500 sataII on areca 1261M.

The workstations are mostly intel quad core machines, 1 2 x dual core,
1 2 x quad core, 1 amd quad core. All workstations have 4 gigs or more of memory.

Glenn

[Bob Zelin]

OK, so before every manufacturer starts the whole song and dance, let me get this straight. You already own a server, a large shared drive volume, and have a network configured (is that correct) – and all you are looking for is shared storage software ? And you have tried doing this with Windows Server – or you have not ? And why do you need fibre channel ?

Alex has made a good first suggestion, but I would like to find out what you already own. Is this for AIW Alton ?

Bob Zelin

Bob Zelin
Rescue 1, Inc.
maxavid@cfl.rr.com

[Nathaniel Cooper]

We’ll you have the hardware set up, so that helps a lot. I’d recommend looking into two options:

1. SANmp
2. MetaSAN

SANmp is going to be easier to set up and maintain, you can likely do it yourself and will provide a volume locking solution.

MetaSAN will be harder to set up and maintain, you will likely need someone who has already set it up and will provide a file locking solution.

Both will work with your hardware as long as the RAIDs show up to the OS as volumes that you can initialize as NTFS volumes.

Good luck!

Nate Cooper
ProMAX
nate.cooper@promax.com

[Glenn Erdos]

Hi Bob,

Thanks for replying! I will try to answer your questions as thoroughly as possible.

— “OK, so before every manufacturer starts the whole song and dance, let me get this straight. You already own a server, a large shared drive volume, and have a network configured (is that correct)” — Yes.

— “and all you are looking for is shared storage software?” — Yes.

— “And you have tried doing this with Windows Server – or you have not? — Yes, I did, but… it did not work good as a shared volume. Same problem, Could not set it up as a “target” without proprietary software. Only worked like another NAS. I could attach as much fc storage to it that I wanted… but could only share it out like nfs, and no other machine could connect to the same volume or major corruption (as I am aware that you know this).

— “And why do you need fibre channel? — Three edit bays that handle multiple tracks for video editing, composites, special effects created from multiple streams, etc. Frame sizes up to 1920 x 1080 full res. at mostly 24 or 29.97 fps. Plus 2 to 48 tracks of audio on two different DAW’s. Sometimes all at the same time. Plus I would like have the ability to work with larger formats. (RED, 2K, XDCAM, etc.)

— “Alex has made a good first suggestion, but I would like to find out what you already own. Is this for AIW Alton?” — No, myself.

As far as equipment goes…

Two Supermicro servers with dual intel dual core with 8+ gigs ram and 8 x 500 sataII drives in each server, set up as raid5 through linux on each, qlogic fc cards.

Qlogic Sanbox 5600, Qlogic 2402 fc cards in all the machines.

The 2 servers are seen by client machines as separate volumes and set to raid0 at the client end, resulting in a raid50 setup.

The iscsi server is an intel server board w/2 quad cores, 16 gigs ram, 4 x 500 sataII raid0, and NAS on same machine as iscsi, 16 x 500 sataII on areca 1261M. with 2gig cache and bat back-up. The iSCSI is ran on an Intel Pro1000 PT quad-port set up as LAG, running on a HP 2848.

The workstations are mostly intel quad core machines, 1, 2 x dual core,
1, 2 x quad core, 2, 1 x quad core, and, 1 amd quad core. All workstations have 4 gigs or more of memory.

There is also a render-farm attached to all of this. The render-farm is used for Blender and After Effects. The render-farm consists of 12 x HP DL360 and 5 x dual node BOXX Technologies render nodes.

All are connected with 3 separate 1GB networks. 1 for management, 1 for render-farm traffic, 1 for work i/o and storage.

Thanks,

Glenn

[Glenn Erdos]

So I have responded with my equipment list… (did you want cameras info too?). I am aware of the two solutions mentioned above, (MetaSan, SanMP), as well as some others. I even spoke through email with someone at SNS about 2 – 4 years ago… but I could not afford it at the time. Now I’m wondering if anything new or different has come out that I maybe don’t know about, that might be less expensive.

I know you are on top of what’s available, what works, and what does not… as well as newer companies and items. I have the greatest respect for the knowledge that you have, as well as all of the guidance, tips, and new product reports that you share with the world. That is why my post was directed to you, Bob Zelin.

I am also aware that there are many, many, other well knowledge people here, and I have great respect for them as well.

I am looking for the least expensive solution for my setup so I can get a more productive use of it without going bankrupt. I have done a lot of homework to get where I am and I feel like I am at a “stuck” point. I understand that I have chosen a very expensive field to get into… just looking for something that will help me get to the next point.

I know there are a couple of software SFS storage products that are somewhat less $ (dependent on amount of storage to be manged, and amount of clients) than MetaSAN and SanMP… but I didn’t find anyone in this field using those SFS solutions. (small shops, not news and broadcast facilities).

A major amount of my equipment has been (unfortunately) used purchases or lucky find’s, donations, etc… I have been my own IT geek, systems builder, troubleshooter, and whatever else necessary, to support my love of audio, video, and graphics, and keep the costs at a minimum.

I have been building this set-up and learning along the way for a very long time… and have spent a lot of time and money, just to get where I am now.

Unless you have, or know of any other, applicable solutions that fit the request of costing less than the 2 solutions above, I will contact them within the next upcoming month or so. Thank you all for you suggestions.

Glenn

[Alex Gerulaitis]

[Glenn Erdos] “I am looking for the least expensive solution for my setup so I can get a more productive use of it without going bankrupt.”

Can’t speak for Bob; for me personally, there’s a limit to how much time I can spend analyzing someone’s specific configuration and workflow demands, and producing sensible recommendations, before it becomes prohibitive (gotta eat, too). IMHO, this is the situation where I’d contact Bob directly and request a paid consultation.

That said, the path of least resistance and most value is NAS. Put a decent NAS front end on top of your existing iSCSI and DAS boxes, with 10GbE links where they matter, and you will likely see significant speed increases at a fairly small cost:
– $2-4K for a WSE or WSS 2012 R2 box (SuperMicro, Dell, HP tower or 1/2U server)
– $1K per 8-port 10GbE switch
– $300-400 per 10GbE card

Windows 8 clients will get the benefit of near-line speeds of SMB3 (i.e. close to possible ceiling of 10Gbs on 10GbE links); Win7 clients get the benefit of SMB2.

The beauty of it is if you’re still not satisfied with speeds or latencies, the 10GbE equipment will work for iSCSI purposes with SNS and Tiger SAN management software; and that WS 2012 box can still be used for other purposes. In other words, it’s nearly fool-proof.

HTH.

Alex Gerulaitis
Systems Engineer
DV411 – Los Angeles, CA

[Bob Zelin]

Glenn –
this is my solution to you. If I were you, I would call this number –
877-299-4111
or
310-838-9000

and ask for Alex. He can assist you with setting up your PC based shared storage system.

Bob Zelin

Bob Zelin
Rescue 1, Inc.
maxavid@cfl.rr.com

[Alex Gerulaitis]

Bob: thank you, it feels great to have your trust.

Forgot to add… Glenn, you already have quite a few boxes that can be repurposed as WS 2012 servers (for SMB3 primarily, and because WS2012 management and features are awesome). Again, making more detailed recommendations will require a little more time.