On the same Window server, have HBAs connected to two diff storage.

[netappmagic]

I wanted to transfer 10TB data from EMC VNX to NetApp FAS storage. Can I use two HBAs on the same server for each storage, and use robcopy to transfer data from one to the other? and also install Host Utility for two different purpose of HBAs? In general what speed would look like for 8Gbits HBAs?

Thanks a lot for your help!

[Eric_Myself]

Hi,

Best solution is to use dedicated migration software solution.

Have a look at DMS from Cirrus Data Solution, already used on NetApp Migration

Regards

Eric

[SeanHatfield]

If the individual luns are under 6TB, and the the cluster version and controller hardware support FLI, consider just importing them directly.  It would be much more efficient than a robocopy job.

[AdvUniMD]

You can of course connect HBAs to two different storage systems from different vendors.

From my experience, what will cause trouble, however, is if you're using management tools, snapshot integration drivers (VSS) or host settings tools from both vendors, as these will generally overwrite each other's settings and get confused easily. for example, SnapDrive might try to snapshot LUNs on 3rd party LUNs and report strange errors.

If you're just connecting these storages for data migration purposes, or are not using any integration tools, you should be fine though.

-Michael

[netappmagic]

If the same HBA ports are used for two different array's, then could it be causing conflicts by using two different Storage Host Utilities?

Assuming that each Host Utilities maintain it's own settings, and also don't change any settings on HBA itself, there should be no any conflicts. Can anybody please verify the assumption here?

[AdvUniMD]

You are right, there *should* be no problems. But fact is, storage vendors usually don't test these scenarios (where a storage array from a different vendor is connected to the same path/fabric)

Normally it should work but if it doesn't, the problems can be very subtle and only manifest in certain specific configurations. We had an issue once where everything seemed to work fine a tfirst, but if you wanted to trigger a storage snapshot on the NetApp you would get hundreds of errors in the event log, and on at least one occasion the machine even bluescreened.

So while it should work, and probably will work for a while, you should be on the lookout for subtle problems...