HP StorageWorks Fabric OS 6.1.1 administrator guide (5697-0235, December 2009)

Fabric OS 6.1.x administrator guide 337
HA and downgrade considerations for LSAN zones
LSAN zones affect high availability and firmware downgrades as follows:
• The LSAN zone matrix is synchronized to the standby CP.
• On a dual CP switch, both CPs need to have Fabric OS 5.3.0 or later to enable the feature.
• If the feature is enabled on the active CP, introducing a CP with an earlier version of Fabric OS as a
standby will cause the HA synchronization to fail.
• If the feature is enabled, before downgrading to an earlier Fabric OS version, you will be asked to go
back to the default mode.
• This feature does not have any impact on current HA functionality. LSANs are synchronized as usual
after the limit is increased and new LSANs are created.
Inter-fabric broadcast frames
The FC router can receive and forward broadcast frames between edge fabrics and between the
backbone fabric and edge fabrics. Many target devices and HBAs cannot handle broadcast frames. If
these devices are connected to switches with Fabric OS 5.3.0 or later, you can set up broadcast zones to
control which devices receive broadcast frames. (See ”Broadcast zones” on page 204 for information
about setting up broadcast zones.)
Broadcast zones are supported only on switches running Fabric OS 5.3.0 or later, so all devices that are
connected to switches running earlier firmware versions will receive broadcast frames.
By default, broadcast frames are forwarded from the FC router to all edge fabrics. You can specify which
fabrics should not receive the broadcast frames, thereby preventing the inter-fabric forwarding of broadcast
frames to switches running older versions of firmware.
For example, in the metaSAN shown in Figure 42, Fabric 1 is running a firmware release earlier than
5.3.0. If the devices connected to this fabric do not support broadcast frames, you can disable the
forwarding of broadcast frames to Fabric 3.
Because all of the switches in Fabric 2 are running Fabric OS 5.3.0 or later, if some of the devices can
handle broadcast frames and some cannot, you can create a broadcast zone in this fabric to specify the
devices that can handle broadcast frames.
Fabric 3 has some switches that are running Fabric OS 5.3.0 and later, and some switches running older
firmware versions. In this case, a broadcast zone will not restrict broadcast frames to the devices that are
connected to the older switches. You need to decide whether to disable the forwarding of broadcast
frames to all the devices in the fabric (using fcrbcastconfig).
Figure 42 Inter-fabric broadcast frames
Edge fabric 3
FC router 1
FC router 2
Backbone fabric
Edge fabric 2
v5.3.0+
Pre-v5.3.0
Edge fabric 1
Fabric OS
v5.3.0 or later
Fabric OS
earlier than v5.3.0