HP StoreEver MSL2024, MSL4048, MSL8048, and MSL8096 Tape Libraries User and Service Guide (AK378-96059, December 2012)

Table Of Contents
Technology for data path port failover
The HP LTO-5 and LTO-6 Fibre Channel tape drives configure both ports with identical worldwide
names but only one port will connect to the fabric. By default the port that completes speed
negotiation first will become the active port. If the ports on the drive are connected to different
speed fabric the port connected to the highest speed fabric will typically complete speed negotiation
first. The HP MSL tape libraries that support data path port failover use the default behavior and
do not allow selection of a preferred port.
Technology for control path failover
The HP LTO-5 and LTO-6 Fibre Channel tape drives use a technology called N-Port Identifier
Virtualization (NPIV) which is defined as part of the Fibre Channel standards maintained by the
INCITS/T11 working group (see clause 6) in the FC-LS-2 specification. NPIV allows a single physical
port to connect to a Fibre Channel switch multiple times using multiple node and port names.
Traditional bridged library control path
A typical connection for a Fibre Channel tape library using the drive to bridge commands to the
library controller in a two drive tape library is shown in Figure 8 (page 24).
Figure 8 Typical bridged library controller connection
1. Internal connection
In the typical bridge library controller connection each tape drive has one physical link to the SAN
switch and connects to the SAN switch as one Fibre Channel device.
The tape drive hosting the library controller path connects as one Fibre Channel device containing
two logical units. The tape drive is logical unit number zero and the tape library is logical unit
number one. Both devices are considered to be in the same Fibre Channel device which is called
a “Node. The tape library Fibre Channel node contains a tape drive logical unit and a media
changer logical unit. The logical view of the tape library is shown in Figure 9 (page 25).
24 Features and overview