EVA command view under a Virtual Machine

[Athletic]

Hi.

We want to manage our EVA4100 under a virtual machine in esx 3.

We've setup a RDM disk (in physical mode) pointing to an EVA LUN.

Under the guest OS (Windows 2003 R2), we can see in Device Manager > Disk Drives a new item, HP HSV200 SCSI disc devide, but after rescaning disks in disc management node, we can't see the disc for formatting it. Also, the eva command view app reports no virtual array found.

Has anybody setup this successfully?

Thanks.

[daniel_uk]

Hi,

Not sure this will work because the EVA needs to have a HBA with direct connection to the fabric to see all other nodes zoned on the host. Newer versions may allow this with NPIV support providing the option to use WWID's with VM's.

HP probably wont support this as it needs to be an applicance or physical server and then you will have the risk of not having external management to your virtual infrastructure when your array has problems.

Not sure points are valid for being so negative but please provide if this helps!

Dan

[Athletic]

Thanks Dan for your answer.

But, I don't understand why I'm not being able of use a RDM disc in Windows. I can't see the disc in Windows disc management so I can't use it. I've tried the same operation with a low cost raid storage successfully.

Does RDM discs from EVA in physical mode work inside a virtual machine?

[daniel_uk]

Hi,

Is the volume showing under the presented LUN ID from Command View when you do Esxcfg-vmhbadevs -M on the ESX host COS?

Thanks

Dan

[Athletic]

No, it's not a vmfs partition.

The output is the VMFS partitions, low-cost storage RDM and EVA RDM are not shown.

[daniel_uk]

Try just esxcfg-vmhbadev or if you prefer just look to see if it is seen by the ESX hosts presented to on Virtualcenter under Configuration > Storage Adapters > Your HBA and you either see the presented raw lun under the list or not. If it's not there then you have problems between the EVA and ESX Host, it does take a few rescan's sometimes for it to appear.

Is this also a blank non signatured lun? It needs to be presented on each ESX host with the same LUN ID.

[dconvery]

I just wanted to add my two cents into this conversation..... ;o)

1. You cannot manage an EVA on a VM currently. The Command View Software requires a fibre channel connection to the HSV controllers. VMware passes only SCSI didk to the VMs.

2. You do not need to make you fibre channel zoning so that all of the hosts using the EVA are "seen" by the Command View server. The EVA and NOT the Command View server registers the WWNs of the attached hosts. You should have one zone for each host and the EVA. Hosts should not share zones.

3. In order to use an EVA LUN as an RDM, you will need to present the LUN to all of the ESX hosts in the cluster as the same LUN ID. This will allow VMotion to work correctly. Then run a rescan on all ESX hosts so that they recognize the unformatted LUN. Edit the VM's settings to point it to the new LUN and then format it under the VM's OS.

Dave

[Schorschi]

Have not tried this, but an HP blade say a HP BL460c or HP BL680c (over kill?) with an HBA published via Virtual Connect would work as well. But still not a VM.

[dconvery]

I use BL460c servers all the time for Command View. Haven't tried it with Virtual Connect though...

Dave

[Nibor]

We use Command view on a BL460c in combination with Virtual Connect, no problems here, works perfectly fine.