HP StorageWorks 2/140 FW 08.01.00 McDATA Products in a SAN Environment Plannin - Page 123

Planning Considerations for Fibre Channel Topologies 3 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR Fabric "A" TM 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR Fabric "B" TM 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR 10/100 RST TM PWR ERR Interswitch Link Fabric Connection Figure 3-16 Redundant Fabrics When deploying redundant fabrics, it is not required that the fabrics be symmetrical. As an example, single-attached devices, such as tape drives and noncritical servers and storage, can be logically grouped and attached to one of the fabrics. Fabric Scalability Businesses are experiencing an unprecedented growth of information and the requirement to maintain that information online. To meet these requirements, Fibre Channel SANs provide the theoretical infrastructure to connect thousands of servers to hundreds of storage devices. To provide enterprise-class performance, scalable fabric designs are required. Refer to Chapter 4, Implementing SAN Internetworking Solutions for detailed information. A scalable fabric allows for nondisruptive addition of fabric elements (directors, fabric switches, and SAN routers) or ISLs to increase the size or performance of the fabric or SAN. Large, scalable fabrics and SANs are constructed by incorporating: Planning Considerations for Fibre Channel Topologies 3-39