Re: Mounting Storage ... NFS?

Pat wrote:
>
> So ... we're getting a new SAN in one of our data centers (a netapp
> 3040). If you're not familiar with netapps, one of their big things is
> that you don't have to buy another head unit to expose storage as NFS
> (as opposed to fiber channel). This is one of those features which
> struck me as only moderately interesting from a database perspective,
> since I just kind of assumed we'd link everything up via fiber channel
> anyway.
>
> That is until we had the netapp rep on the phone and he blithely
> suggested we mount the primary storage on our database servers as NFS.
>
> After I finished coughing up a lung (since my instinct is never, ever,
> ever put operation storage on NFS for latency and stability reasons),
> he went on to assure us that this is an Oracle recommended
> configuration and, in fact, the Oracle On Demand grid uses precisely
> this approach.
>
> Is anybody actually doing this? I'm assuming with fast ethernet
> (10GBS) and low collision rates, I could get good throughput
> relatively to a 4GBS fiber channel card, but there's be inevitable
> latency issues added wouldn't there?
>
> Is my instinct to run screaming from any kind of NFS storage archaic,
> or is the netapp guy just spouting a load of hooey?

We're running 10g and 11g RAC clusters on Netapp (FAS 6040) and its just peachy...

-- 
Connor McDonald
Co-author: "Mastering Oracle PL/SQL - Practical Solutions"
Co-author: "Oracle Insight - Tales of the OakTable"

web: http://www.oracledba.co.uk
web: http://www.oaktable.net
email: connor_mcdonald_at_yahoo.com


"Semper in excremento, sole profundum qui variat."

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