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IBM DS4700 Overview & Deep Dive SAN Technology
IBM DS4700 Overview & Deep Dive SAN Technology
IBM DS4700 Overview & Deep Dive SAN Technology
technology
by Vudagandla Srikanth Published July 28, 2016 Updated July 28, 2016
In this article we are going to see Overview of IBM DS4700 SAN. The DS4700
express storage system is the latest to the DS4000 Series providing high
performance, drive intermixing, high storage density and fully-features storage
Manager Software to Manage SAN environment.
In this DS4700 SAN two models are available, Model 70 and 72. Model 70 has
total 4 host ports, 2GB of Cache and high performance model No 72 has total 8
Host ports and 4GB Cache, designed to provide the right processing power
when needed. Unless otherwise stated for variation, We will continue to discuss
both models as DS4700 Express for simplicity.
Fibre Channel (FC) and SATA disk drives both are supported, as well as mixing
those two technologies within the same enclosure and up to 6 additional disk
drive expansion units, such as the DS4000 EXP810 (Expansion Enclosure), can
be attached to the IBM DS4700 express storage system for a maximum total of
112 disk drives.
Sensible Cost:
Looking at the DS4700 Express model 70 and 72, a key motivation for several
features was to be cost conscious: higher density controller enclosures, adding
disk drives inside the controllers, better host connectivity, multiple cache
capacity options, etc.
Connectivity: With 8 host ports for part of either hosts or switches and 4
drive side loops there is double the connectivity and the imaginable for higher
performance when compared with earlier products.
The diagram below displays the components visible from the rear of the
DS4700 Express Controller Module:
The visual above identifies this unit as a DS4700 Express Model 72, since each
of the dual controllers has four host interfaces. The corresponding DS4700
Express Model 70 visual would look like identical, with the exception that the
each controller would have only two host ports.
The diagram below is a view of the rear of the DS4000 EXP810 Expansion
Enclosure.
Sample Cabling Diagram
The DS4700 Express storage systems four external drive loops are configured
as two redundant pairs and with each pair cabling a maximum of three
enclosures to the controller module.
The diagram shows a fully configured DS4700 Express storage system with six
DS4000 EXP810 Expansion Enclosures. The DS4700 will support 2Gb disk
drive modules for the highest availability, The storage system utilizes a top-
down and bottom-up cabling scheme to ensure access to available expansion
units.