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Brocade 415, 425, 815 and 825 Fibre Channel HBAs

Brocade 415 and 425 4 Gbps Fibre Channel Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) and Brocade 815 and 825 8 Gbps Fibre Channel HBAs are a new class of server connectivity products with unmatched hardware capabilities and unique software features. This new class of HBAs is designed to help IT organizations deploy and manage end-to-end Storage Area Network (SAN) services across next-generation data centers.

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UNIFIED MANAGEMENT
Brocade Network Advisor can monitor and manage multiple HBAs across a data center simultaneously—along with Brocade switches, directors, and backbones—all from a single central location. This enables organizations to monitor performance across groups of HBAs and HBA ports at the same time, capture diagnostics information automatically in the event of a failure, and receive proactive alerts when HBA events occur.

Brocade HBAs also enable VM discovery in VMware ESX environments within Brocade Network Advisor. VM discovery provides an end-to-end view of the VM-to-Logical Unit Number (LUN) path information for all the VMs running on each physical server, with detailed information such as host OS, assigned CPU and memory resources, and all the data stores associated with each VM. This provides unprecedented levels of visibility into the virtual server infrastructure for SAN administrators, enabling them to more efficiently manage their storage network resources. Coupled with N_Port ID Virtualization (NPIV), Brocade Network Advisor can also provide end-to-end performance statistics with VM granularity.

Boot-over-SAN enables the deployment of both Direct-Attached Storage (DAS) point-to-point topology as well as diskless servers and centralized management of OS images in the shared storage pool. Traditional boot-over-SAN environments, however, require access to each individual HBA BIOS (and each individual server console), making them cumbersome to configure, laborious to maintain, and prone to human error. To simplify the management of boot-over-SAN environments, Brocade HBAs provide fabric-based boot LUN discovery—a feature that enables each server to automatically retrieve its boot LUN information from the switch fabric. This provides a centralized management point for all boot-over-SAN operations through Brocade Network Advisor, enabling organizations to fully reap the benefits of diskless servers.

All HBA management and VM visibility features are available across all three editions of Brocade Network Advisor: Professional, Professional Plus, and Enterprise. For simple device configuration, driver updates, or to obtain HBA and port statistics, a Graphical User Interface (GUI) element manager and a Command Line Interface (CLI) are also available. Both Brocade Network Advisor and the element manager provide open APIs and standards-based interfaces for integration with popular third-party applications and higher-level frameworks to help orchestrate Brocade hardware and SAN services.

Brocade 415, 425, 815 and 825 Fibre Channel HBAs
Figure 1. Brocade Network Advisor provides unified management of SAN and HBA resources with end-to-end VM visibility.

UNMATCHED PERFORMANCE
With the recent advances in server technology, including Intel Nehalem processors, servers are now capable of running more workloads than ever. This drives higher consolidation and virtualization ratios, with more VMs being deployed per server, which in turn drives unprecedented I/O requirements. The superior performance of Brocade HBAs provides the necessary bandwidth and I/O power for the most demanding environments.

Brocade 415, 425, 815 and 825 Fibre Channel HBAs
Figure 2. Brocade HBAs can provide more than three times the performance of competing offerings in real-world application scenarios.

Ultimately, this means that businesses of all sizes can scale their virtual server deployments and virtualize high-demanding applications with greater confidence, resulting in better server resource utilization and lower capital and operational costs.

OPTIMIZED FOR VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS
In a non-virtualized environment, every application is tied to a physical server, which in turn connects to a physical SAN switch port in a "static" manner. Applying network policies such as zoning or QoS—or monitoring application performance—is simple because the application is permanently associated with the physical port.

With server virtualization, multiple applications reside in a physical server and share a physical SAN port. Furthermore, applications can move across the virtualized server infrastructure, based on a number of user-defined policies, to respond to dynamic business requirements. A virtualization-aware SAN infrastructure and server connectivity solution enables organizations to apply network policies at the VM level. Such policies will then be able to "follow" the application transparently as it moves to a new physical server.

Brocade HBAs were built from the ground up with virtualization in mind. They support NPIV with up to 255 virtual ports, and they are qualified with all major hypervisor solutions in the industry. Leveraging NPIV technology, organizations can not only extend Brocade fabric services to the server, but all the way to the VM and application level. Server Application Optimization (SAO) helps IT organizations avoid downtime and more effectively meet their SLAs by allowing them to apply QoS policies with a per-VM granularity and ensure that mission-critical VMs will not be affected in the event of HBA link congestion—even as they move across the infrastructure. SAO also provides isolation to protect individual VMs from the effect of slow-drain devices that would otherwise impact the entire physical server and all applications.

Brocade 415, 425, 815 and 825 Fibre Channel HBAs
Figure 3. SAO extends QoS to the VM level.

415, 425, 815 and 825 Fibre Channel HBA Resources

Browse a complete listing of all Brocade resources. View All Resources

Abstract:

Delivering more than twice the performance of competing HBAs, Brocade FC HBAs also offer advanced features supporting enterprise-class, end-to-end storage networking solutions.

Abstract:

A key component of the Brocade Data Center Fabric (DC F) architecture, Fabric-Based Boot LUNLUN Discovery delivers reliable diskless server deployment for the virtualized data center. Deploying diskless servers versus servers with locally attached storage reduces power consumption, improves server reliability, and speeds up server provisioning.

Abstract:

The Brocade family of 4 and 8 Gbit/sec Fibre Channel (FC) Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) support a unique combination of enabling technologies that remove barriers to virtualizing the most demanding business applications.

Abstract:

Leveraging the extension of Advanced Fabric Services to virtual workloads via embedded Host Bus Adapter (HBA) technologies, Brocade has built Virtual Channel technology into its switches and HBAs, to facilitate end-to-end QoS. This HBA integration solution is designed to help IT organizations deploy and manage true end-to-end Storage Area Network (SAN) services across next-generation virtualized data centers.

Abstract:

Brocade has extended its ISL Trunking technology, which consolidates and aggregates multiple ISLs between switches into a single logical connection, into the host using Brocade FC HBAs. Two ports can be trunked on a dual-port HBA into one logical port, providing double the bandwidth of a single port and guaranteeing maximum utilization of the total bandwidth.

Abstract:

The highest levels of performance and Brocade Adaptive Networking features, which have previously been available only in Storage Area Network (SAN) Fibre Channel (FC) switches, combined with industryleading availability and management make Brocade Fibre Channel (FC) Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) the best choice for use with Microsoft Exchange.

Abstract:

IBM offers a broad Information Management Software line. DB2 is one of IBM’s Relational Database Management System (RDBMS) software products—with industry-leading performance on distributed systems, offering unparalleled efficiencies for staffing and storage.

Abstract:

As customers require access to their data not only in the enterprise space but also from cloud services and mobile devices, new demands are being placed on database performance. This paper examines the server I/O requirements to support Microsoft SQL Server deployments effectively.

Abstract:

Today’s SAP applications consist of multiple individual instances, such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Business Information Warehouse (BW), Customer Relationship Management (CRM, or SCM), and Process Integration (PI). They are implemented in the well-known three-stage approach (production, quality assurance, and development). SAP is a good example to demonstrate Brocade optimization solutions from the storage and networking perspective.

Abstract:

The Brocade Host Connectivity Manager (HCM) is uniquely tailored to address the needs of server administrators, while Brocade Data Center Fabric Manager (DCFM) maximizes the productivity of the SAN administrator. Together, these tools offer an integrated end-to-end SAN management suite for the enterprise data center.

Abstract:

With Brocade Server Application Optimization (SAO), Brocade HBAs deliver much more than leading SAN connectivity performance. When used with Brocade storage fabrics with SAO, only Brocade HBAs enable advanced Adaptive Networking features, such as QoS, designed to ensure Service Level Agreements (SLAs) in dynamic or unpredictable enterprise-class virtual server environments with mixed-SLA workloads.

Abstract:

Recent benchmarking of the Brocade 815 Fibre Channel HBA clearly demonstrates 2x performance leadership in the 8 Gbit/sec HBA category. The level of I/O performance confirmed by Medusa Labs Testing Service is unique to Brocade or Brocade’s OEM solutions. In the virtualized data center with consolidation of physical servers, only Brocade FC HBAs can ensure that your data center fabric provides the scalability needed to meet virtualization requirements.

Abstract:

In today’s enterprise-class data centers, administrators do not have the luxury of time. Keeping track of driver and firmware versions creates a management nightmare. Brocade believes that this complexity is an unnecessary burden on administrators, which is why we developed a unified driver approach in which firmware is embedded into the driver package.

Abstract:

Brocade Server Application Optimization (SAO) works in conjunction with Brocade adapters to enhance overall application performance and Virtual Machine (VM) scalability by extending Brocade data center fabric technologies, such as Quality of Service, to the application level.

Abstract:

This Support Matrix or Cross Reference may include tested compatible operating systems, servers, storage, tape devices, switches and third-party software, as well as partner certified applications for Brocade or Brocade's OEM-branded HBAs, as well as Emulex and QLogic HBAs, with native and OEM part number cross references.

Abstract:

This Support Matrix or Cross Reference may include tested compatible operating systems, servers, storage, tape devices, switches and third-party software, as well as partner certified applications for Brocade or Brocade's OEM-branded HBAs, as well as Emulex and QLogic HBAs, with native and OEM part number cross references.

Abstract:

This Support Matrix or Cross Reference may include tested compatible operating systems, servers, storage, tape devices, switches and third-party software, as well as partner certified applications for Brocade or Brocade's OEM-branded HBAs, as well as Emulex and QLogic HBAs, with native and OEM part number cross references.

Abstract:

This Support Matrix or Cross Reference may include tested compatible operating systems, servers, storage, tape devices, switches and third-party software, as well as partner certified applications for Brocade or Brocade's OEM-branded HBAs, as well as Emulex and QLogic HBAs, with native and OEM part number cross references.

Abstract:

Beiersdorf boosts server performance with Brocade SAN and server connectivity solutions while simplifying data center management with Brocade DCFM

Abstract:

Describes a recommended setup and configuration for Fabric-Based Boot LUN Discovery in a Brocade storage network using Brocade Host Bus Adapters (HBAs).

Abstract:

Providing server connectivity products is the next step in fulfilling Brocade’s mission to deliver enterprise-class, end-to-end storage networking solutions. With Brocade server connectivity solutions, Brocade is now extending fabric-based services to data center server platforms for dependable and high-performance storage access.

Abstract:

Outlines VMware ESXi Server 4.0 support and deployment guidelines for Brocade Fibre Channel (FC) Host Bus Adapter (HBA) and Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) Converged Network Adapter (CNA) drivers; also discusses several management paradigms for the VMware ESXi environment.