Creating shared storage with a DELL Powervault and two PowerEdges.

[CourtLNet36]

I know some of you on here have a setup similar to this, and I am having some issues getting all the drives in the PowerVault to act as a single storage point for both servers.
Both PowerEdge 2450s have single PERC3/DC cards, and I have a single PowerVault with 8 drives. I have attempted to run the SCSI cables from each server to either plug on the PowerVault, so the PowerVault is plugged in on both sides. But all this does is split the backplane so half of the drives are seen by one server and the other half are seen by the other. I have enabled clustering on both PERCs and still the same thing.
I can't find a PowerVault manual anywhere, and the PERC manual is no help (as is the Dell website). Any clues?

 

[resoremix]

CourtLNet36

Just saw this post afer replying to your other post on my Active / Passive Slow Failover thread.

I'd bet it's your Powervault SCSI interfaces as I described in that post. You'll need to buy a couple from Dell for about £500.

Hope it goes well.

 

[kfriend]

Did you switch the jumpers on the Powervault? If I remember correctly, my older powervault required me to yank the cards and switch the jumpers...whereas the newer powervault automatically detected the state.

You can get a copy of the powervault manual at

http://support.dell.com

 

[kfriend]

Here's information on the Powervault 200,201,210 & 211

CONFIGURING THE ESEM OR SEMM FOR CLUSTER OPERATION

-LOCATE THE TWO PIN JUMPER ON THE ESEM OR SEMM JP8 (THE CARDS ON THE POWERVAULT, YANK THEM OUT)
-MOVE THE JUMPERS ON BOTH CARDS TO JP8 (FORCE JOINED)

You can find this information on the support website. Choose your system, choose system documentation and download the literature.

I hope this helps.

I do not think you need to purchase an additional SCSI card. The only reason you may have to purchase an additional PERC card is to enable hardware raid.

Please let me know how you make out.

MCSE/MCDBA
SANS GIAC + SANS FIREWALL