Cisco Systems DSC9148D8G48PK9 Port Identifier Virtualization, Port Virtualization, Npiv Example

Chapter 7 Configuring N Port Virtualization

Information About N Port Virtualization

•Cisco Fabric Switch for HP c-Class BladeSystem

•Cisco Fabric Switch for IBM BladeCenter

•Cisco Nexus 5000 Series switches

Note NPV is available on these switches only while in NPV mode; if in switch mode, NPV is not available.

N Port Identifier Virtualization

N port identifier virtualization (NPIV) provides a means to assign multiple FC IDs to a single N port. This feature allows multiple applications on the N port to use different identifiers and allows access control, zoning, and port security to be implemented at the application level. Figure 7-1shows an example application using NPIV.

Figure 7-1 NPIV Example

Application

server

E-mail

Web

Print

Node

LUN 1

N_Port_ID 1

LUN 2

N_Port_ID 2

LUN 3

N_Port_ID 3

Nport

controller

MDS switch

F port

154019

You must globally enable NPIV for all VSANs on the MDS switch to allow the NPIV-enabled applications to use multiple N port identifiers.

Note All of the N port identifiers are allocated in the same VSAN.

N Port Virtualization

Typically, Fibre Channel networks are deployed using a core-edge model with a large number of fabric switches connected to edge devices. Such a model is cost-effective because the per port cost for director class switches is much higher than that of fabric switches. However, as the number of ports in the fabric increases, the number of switches deployed also increases, and you can end up with a significant increase in the number of domain IDs (the maximum number supported is 239). This challenge becomes even more difficult when additional blade chassis are deployed in Fibre Channel networks.

NPV addresses the increase in the number of domain IDs needed to deploy a large number of the ports by making a fabric or blade switch appear as a host to the core Fibre Channel switch, and as a Fibre Channel switch to the servers in the fabric or blade switch. NPV aggregates multiple locally connected N ports into one or more external NP links, which shares the domain ID of the NPV core switch among multiple NPV switches. NPV also allows multiple devices to attach to same port on the NPV core switch, which reduces the need for more ports on the core.

	Cisco MDS 9000 Family NX-OS Interfaces Configuration Guide
7-2	OL-29284-01, Release 6.x