HP 3PAR Solaris Implementation Guide

The following fill-word modes are supported on a Brocade 8 G/s switch running FOS firmware
6.3.1a and later:
admin>portcfgfillword
Usage: portCfgFillWord PortNumber Mode [Passive]
Mode: 0/-idle-idle - IDLE in Link Init, IDLE as fill word (default)
1/-arbff-arbff - ARBFF in Link Init, ARBFF as fill word
2/-idle-arbff - IDLE in Link Init, ARBFF as fill word (SW)
3/-aa-then-ia - If ARBFF/ARBFF failed, then do IDLE/ARBFF
HP recommends that you set the fill word to mode 3 (aa-then-ia), which is the preferred
mode using the portcfgfillword command. If the fill word is not correctly set, er_bad_os
counters (invalid ordered set) will increase when you use the portstatsshow command
while connected to 8 G HBA ports, as they need the ARBFF-ARBFF fill word. Mode 3 will
also work correctly for lower-speed HBAs, such as 4 G/2 G HBAs. For more information, see
the Fabric OS command Reference Manual and the FOS release notes.
In addition, some Fabric switches, such as the HP SN8000B 8-slot SAN backbone director
switch, the HP SN8000B 4-slot SAN director switch, the HP SN6000B 16 Gb FC switch, or
the HP SN3000B 16 Gb FC switch automatically select the proper fill-word mode 3 as the
default setting.
• McDATA switch or director ports should be in their default modes as G or GX-port (depending
on the switch model), with their speed setting permitting them to autonegotiate.
• Cisco switch ports that connect to HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage ports or host HBA ports should
be set to AdminMode = FX and AdminSpeed = auto port, with the speed set to auto negotiate.
Target Port Limits and Specifications
To avoid overwhelming a target port and ensure continuous I/O operations, observe the following
limitations on a target port:
• Maximum of 64 host server ports per HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage port, with a maximum total
of 1,024 host server ports per HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage.
• I/O queue depth on each HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage HBA model, as follows:
Emulex 4G: 959◦
◦ HP 3PAR HBA 4G: 1638
◦ HP 3PAR HBA 8G: 3276 (HP 3PAR StoreServ 10000 and HP 3PAR StoreServ 7000
systems only)
• The I/O queues are shared among the connected host server HBA ports on a first-come,
first-served basis.
• When all queues are in use and a host HBA port tries to initiate I/O, it receives a target queue
full response from the HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage port. This condition can result in erratic I/O
performance on each host server. If this condition occurs, each host server should be throttled
so that it cannot overrun the HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage port's queues when all host servers
are delivering their maximum number of I/O requests.
NOTE: When host server ports can access multiple targets on fabric zones, the assigned
target number assigned by the host driver for each discovered target can change when the
host server is booted and some targets are not present in the zone. This situation may change
the device node access point for devices during a host server reboot. This issue can occur
with any fabric-connected storage, and is not specific to the HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage.
12 Configuring the HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage for Fibre Channel