Dell DX6000 User manual

Dell DX Object Storage

Platform

User’s Guide

book.book Page 1 Tuesday, September 28, 2010 12:18 PM

Notes, Cautions, and Warnings

NOTE: A NOTE indicates important information that helps you make better use of

your computer.

CAUTION: A CAUTION indicates potential damage to hardware or loss of data if

instructions are not followed.

WARNING: A WARNING indicates a potential for property damage, personal

injury, or death.

____________________

Information in this publication is subject to change without notice.

Reproduction of these materials in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of Dell Inc.

is strictly forbidden.

Trademarks used in this text: Dell™, the DELL logo, PowerEdge™,and OpenManage™ are

trademarks of Dell Inc. Red Hat Enterprise Linux®and Enterprise Linux®are registered trademarks

of Red Hat, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries.

Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this publication to refer to either the entities claiming

the marks and names or their products. Dell Inc. disclaims any proprietary interest in trademarks and

trade names other than its own.

October 2010 Rev. A01

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Contents 3

Contents

1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

2 DX Object Storage Platform Overview . . . 9

Network Topologies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Local Cluster Configuration. . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Subcluster Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Remote Cluster Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Application Access to DX Object

Storage Platform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

Communicating With a Local Cluster. . . . . . . . 19

Communicating With a Remote Cluster . . . . . . 19

3 Setting Up the DX Object

Storage Platform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Installing the Initial Cluster or Redundant

Cluster Services Node . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Configuring the DX Object Storage Platform . . . . . . 21

Adding Additional DX Storage Nodes. . . . . . . . . . 22

Installing the System in a Rack . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Cabling the Appliance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Turning On the DX Storage Node. . . . . . . . . . 23

Enabling Capacity in DX Cluster

Services Console . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

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4Contents

Adding Network Adapter to DX

Storage Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Adding Network Adapters to DX Cluster

Services Nodes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

4 Updating the Dell DX Object

Storage Platform Software . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Checking Software Version Compatibility . . . . . . . 26

Using the DX Object Storage Platform

Compatibility Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Troubleshooting the Compatibility Manager . . . . 27

Updating the DX Cluster Services Node Software . . . 28

Updating the DX Storage Node Software . . . . . . . . 28

Receiving System Software Update

Notifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Updating OpenManage Server Administrator . . . 29

5 Disaster Recovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Recovery Solution Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Recovering From Disk Failures . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Single Disk Failure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Two Disk Failure. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Detecting and Monitoring Disk Failures . . . . . . . . 33

Reinstalling the Operating System. . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Configuring and Managing RAID . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Recovering the Operating System . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

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Contents 5

Configuring the Partitions During

Operating System Recovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Reinstalling the DX Cluster Services

Node Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Setting Up and Configuring the Network . . . . . . 37

Connecting the DX Cluster Services Node to the

Private and Public Networks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Connecting the DX Storage Nodes to the

Private Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Creating a Local YUM Repository on the

DX6000 System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Installing Dell DX Compatibility Manager . . . . . . . 40

Installing Dell OpenManage

Server Administrator. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Installing DX Cluster Services Node Software . . . . . 41

Configuring the DX Cluster Services

Node Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Restoring the Cluster Configurations . . . . . . . . . . 42

Bringing Up the DX Storage Cluster. . . . . . . . . . . 42

6 Additional References. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Software Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Hardware Documents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Systems Management Documents . . . . . . . . . . . 45

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6Contents

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Introduction 7

Introduction

The Dell DX Object Storage Platform provides a simple and cost effective

pool of storage for less active or fixed content. The object storage platform

allows you to:

• Expand the capacity to meet rapidly changing needs without disrupting

services.

• Set policies for file retention and replication.

• Distribute information to multiple geographic locations.

• Integrate through an HTTP based interface.

The DX Object Storage Platform includes the following hardware and

software:

•DellDX6

a00

Cluster Services Node.

• Two or more Dell DX6

axy

S Object Storage Nodes.

• A preinstalled operating system and Dell OpenManage software on the DX

Cluster Services Node.

• Dell DX Object Storage Platform software.

The Dell DX solution components are uniquely identified with the following

naming conventions:

•StorageNode(SN)—DX6

axy

S (where

is a variable depicting the

generation, and

is a variable depicting the number of drives (12 for the

DX6012S platform), and

is a fixed alphanumeric character that indicates

a storage node).

• Cluster Services Node (CSN)—DX6

a00

(the “

” is a variable depicting

generation).

book.book Page 7 Tuesday, September 28, 2010 12:18 PM

8Introduction

Table 1-1 lists the terms used in this document to refer to various

components of the DX Object Storage Platform.

Table 1-1. Terms Used in the Document

Component Description

DX Object Storage Cluster DX6a00S system and two or more DX6axyS

systems

DX Cluster Services Node,

Cluster Services Node or CSN

DX6a00 system

DX Object Storage Node, DX

Storage Node or SN

DX6axyS system

DX Content Router Software component on the DX6a00 system

DX Object Storage Software Software component on the DX6axyS system

book.book Page 8 Tuesday, September 28, 2010 12:18 PM

DX Object Storage Platform Overview 9

DX Object Storage Platform

Overview

Network Topologies

The Dell DX Object Storage Platform network consists of one or more DX

Storage Clusters connected by DX Content Router services. There are many

possible network topologies depending on the storage network goals. All

networks share the following features:

• One or two DX Cluster Services Nodes that provide services to the storage

cluster.

• Two or more DX Storage Nodes that provide data storage services.

• Ethernet switches to enable required services within a storage cluster

(private network) and access to the storage nodes from outside the cluster

(public network).

• Services such as Domain Name System (DNS) and Dynamic Host

Configuration Protocol (DHCP).

NOTE: DX Storage Cluster requires a dedicated internal network to ensure that the

storage cluster traffic is protected from unauthorized access. The dedicated

network also ensures that the external or corporate network is isolated from both

the PXE boot server and cluster multicast traffic.

All network services required by the cluster are present in the

DX Cluster

Services Node

software bundle and preinstalled on the

Cluster Services Node

The DX Storage Cluster is automatically configured with defaults for all

network parameters that should be sufficient for most simple configurations.

All network parameters can be set manually to support more complex

configurations. For detailed information about setting network parameters,

see the DX Object Storage Getting Started Guide, and the DX Object Storage

Advanced Administration Guide at support.dell.com/manuals.

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10 DX Object Storage Platform Overview

Network switch configuration depends on both the network topology and the

customer environment. To ensure proper functioning with default network

parameters and to maximize cluster performance, it is recommended that you

follow the best practices listed below, while configuring both the private and

public networks switches.

• Disable link aggregation configuration as the DX Object Storage Nodes

bond the system NIC ports in balanced-alb modes.

• Disable jumbo frames.

• Disable spanning tree protocol, if the switches are not being trunked.

• Disable Flow Control.

NOTE: If switches are trunked, enable spanning tree protocol and port fast on the

data intensive ports.

Contact Dell to customize the network configurations to meet the solution

needs. For more information about configuring the network for the Dell DX

Object Storage Platform, see "Network Topology" in the DX Object Storage

Advanced Administration Guide at support.dell.com/manuals.

Local Cluster Configuration

A basic Dell DX Storage Cluster consists of at least one

DX Cluster Services

Node

and at least two

DX Storage Nodes

, along with the necessary Ethernet

infrastructure to connect them. See Figure 2-1.

Within a cluster,

DX Storage Nodes

communicate with each other through

User Datagram Protocol (UDP) and IP multicast. All nodes within a cluster

must be on the same IP subnet. The

DX Cluster Services Node

also

participates in UDP and multicast communication and must be located

within the same subnet.

The Layer 3 switch (IP router) used to create the storage cluster subnet must:

• Restrict UDP and multicast network to the cluster subnet

• Pass TCP (HTTP) traffic to and from the DX Cluster Services Node and

DX Storage Nodes

NOTE: You do not require a load-balancer in front of the storage cluster. The

applications communicate directly with the DX Object Storage Platform through

HTTP.

book.book Page 10 Tuesday, September 28, 2010 12:18 PM

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