Dell Compellent Storage Center

XenServer 6.x Best Practices

Dell Compellent Storage Center XenServer 6.x Best Practices

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Dell Compellent Storage Center XenServer 6.x Best Practices

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Document revision

Date Revision Description

2/16/2009 1 Initial 5.0 Documentation

5/21/2009 2 Documentation update for 5.5

10/1/2010 3 Document Revised for 5.6 and iSCSI

MPIO

12/21/2010 3.1 Updated iSCSI information

8/22/2011 4.0 Documentation updated for 6.0

11/29/2011 4.1 Update for Software iSCSI information

THIS BEST PRACTICES GUIDE IS FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY, AND MAY CONTAIN

TYPOGRAPHICAL ERRORS AND TECHNICAL INACCURACIES. THE CONTENT IS PROVIDED AS IS, WITHOUT

EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND.

© 2011 Dell Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this material in any manner whatsoever without

the express written permission of Dell Inc. is strictly forbidden. For more information, contact Dell.

Dell, the DELL logo, the DELL badge, and Compellent are trademarks of Dell Inc. Other trademarks and

trade names may be used in this document to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names

Dell Compellent Storage Center XenServer 6.x Best Practices

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or their products. Dell Inc. disclaims any proprietary interest in trademarks and trade names other than

its own.

Dell Compellent Storage Center XenServer 6.x Best Practices

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Contents Document revision ................................................................................................. 3

Contents .................................................................................................................. 5

General syntax ..................................................................................................... 8

Conventions ......................................................................................................... 8

Preface ................................................................................................................... 9

Audience ............................................................................................................ 9

Purpose .............................................................................................................. 9

Customer support .................................................................................................. 9

Introduction ........................................................................................................... 10

XenServer Storage Overview ........................................................................................ 11

XenServer Storage Terminology ............................................................................... 11

Shared iSCSI Storage............................................................................................. 11

Shared Fibre Channel Storage ................................................................................. 12

Shared NFS ........................................................................................................ 13

Volume to Virtual Machine Mapping .................................................................... 14

NIC Bonding vs. iSCSI MPIO ................................................................................ 14

Multi-Pathing ..................................................................................................... 15

Enable Multi-pathing in XenCenter...................................................................... 15

Software iSCSI ......................................................................................................... 16

Overview .......................................................................................................... 16

Open iSCSI initiator Setup with Dell Compellent ........................................................... 17

Multipath with Dual Subnets ................................................................................... 17

Configuring Dedicated Storage NIC ...................................................................... 18

To Assign NIC Functions using the XE CLI ............................................................... 18

XenServer Software iSCSI Setup.......................................................................... 19

Login to Compellent Control Ports ...................................................................... 19

Configure Server Objects in Enterprise Manager ..................................................... 20

View Multipath Status ..................................................................................... 22

Multi-path Requirements with Single Subnet ............................................................... 23

Configuring Bonded Interface ............................................................................ 23

Configuring Dedicated Storage Network ............................................................... 24

To assign NIC functions using the XE CLI: .............................................................. 25

XenServer Software iSCSI Setup.......................................................................... 25

Dell Compellent Storage Center XenServer 6.x Best Practices

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Configure Server Objects in Enterprise Manager ..................................................... 27

Multi-path Requirements with Dual Subnets, Legacy Port Mode ........................................ 28

Log in to Dell Compellent iSCSI Target Ports .......................................................... 30

View Multipath Status ..................................................................................... 33

iSCSI SR Using iSCSI HBA ........................................................................................ 33

Fibre Channel ......................................................................................................... 38

Overview .......................................................................................................... 38

Adding a FC LUN to XenServer Pool .......................................................................... 38

Data Instant Replay to Recover Virtual Machines or Data ................................................ 40

Overview ..................................................................................................... 40

Recovery Option 1 – One VM per LUN ........................................................................ 40

Recovery Option 2 – Recovery Server ........................................................................ 50

Dynamic Capacity ..................................................................................................... 62

Dynamic Capacity Overview .............................................................................. 62

Dynamic Capacity with XenServer ....................................................................... 62

Data Progression ...................................................................................................... 63

Data Progression on XenServer ........................................................................... 63

Boot from SAN ......................................................................................................... 64

VM Metadata Backup and Recovery ............................................................................... 65

Backing Up VM MetaData ....................................................................................... 65

Importing VM MetaData ......................................................................................... 67

Disaster Recovery ..................................................................................................... 68

Replication Overview ........................................................................................... 68

Test XenServer Disaster Recovery ....................................................................... 70

Recovering from a Disaster .................................................................................... 73

Replication Based Disaster Recovery ......................................................................... 77

Disaster Recovery Replication Example ................................................................ 77

Live Volume ....................................................................................................... 82

Overview .......................................................................................................... 82

Appendix 1 Troubleshooting ........................................................................................ 84

XenServer Pool FC Mapping Issue ............................................................................. 84

Starting Software iSCSI ......................................................................................... 85

Two ways to Start iSCSI .......................................................................