Fibre Channel Technologies

Module 2

2006 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice

Objectives
Identify the Fibre Channel function levels Describe Fibre Channel cables Discuss HP support for Fibre Channel ISL SAN extensions

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Fibre Channel
A high-performance interconnect and serial I/O protocol that delivers:
Reliability Throughput Distance flexibility

The function levels of the Fibre Channel standard define:

Physical media and transmission rates Coding schemes Framing protocols and flow control Common services Upper-level application interfaces

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Fibre Channel protocol architecture Function levels

Channels Networks

FC4 FC3 FC2 FC1

IPI

SCS I

HIPPI

SBCCS

802.2

IP

ATM
Node

Common Services Signaling / Framing Protocol / Flow Control

Port

Encode / Decode

FC0
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133Mb/s

266Mb/s

531Mb/s

1063Mb/s

2125Mb/s

4250Mb/s

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FC-0 Physical level

Defines the physical link in the Fibre Channel system
Media type Connection Transceivers Electrical and optical characteristics needed to connect ports

Includes data rate

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FC-1 Coding level

Defines the 8-bit/10-bit encoding and decoding scheme

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FC-2 Signaling Protocol level

The transport mechanism of Fibre Channel
Framing rules

Payload
Service classes and control mechanisms Management of data transfer sequence

Building blocks
Ordered sets Frames Sequences

Exchanges
Protocols

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Ordered sets
Frame delimiters
SOF EOF

Primitive signals
Idle

R_RDY

Primitive sequences
OLS

NOS
LR LRR

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Frames
4 bytes SOF

24 bytes frame header

2112 bytes data field 64 bytes optional header 2048 bytes payload

4 bytes CRC error check

4 bytes EOF

CTL

Source address

Destination address

Type

Seq_Cnt

Seq_ID

Exchange_ID

Fibre Channel frame

Frame categories
Data frames

Link control frames

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Frame header
2112 bytes data field 64 bytes optional header 2048 bytes payload 4 bytes CRC error check

4 bytes SOF

24 bytes frame header

4 bytes EOF

CTL

Source address

Destination address

Type

Frame header

Seq_Cnt

Seq_ID

Exchange_ID

Frame header

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Flow control
Is the FC-2 control process that paces the flow of frames Is managed by the sequence initiator (source) and sequence recipient (destination) ports using Credit and Credit_CNT

Types of flow control

End-to-end Paces the flow of frames between N_Ports

Buffer-to-buffer Is managed between an N_Port and an F_Port or between N_Ports in point-to-point topology Each port is responsible for managing BB_Credit_CNT

Service classes
Flow control is dependent on the service classes
Class 1 frames use end-to-end flow control Class 3 frames use only buffer-to-buffer Class 2 frames use both types of flow control
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Sequence
A set of one or more related frames transmitted unidirectionally from one N_Port to another

Exchange
One or more non-concurrent sequences for a single operation

Protocols
Are specific to higher-layer services Include
Primitive sequence protocols
Fabric login protocol N_Port login protocol Data transfer protocol N_Port logout protocol
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Classes of service (1 of 2)
HP supports Class 2, 3, and F only Class 1 Dedicated connection service
Connection-oriented Acknowledged delivery

Class 2 Multiplexed service

Connectionless
Acknowledged delivery

Class 3 Datagram service

Connectionless
Unacknowledged delivery

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Classes of service (2 of 2)
Class 4 Virtual connections
Similar to Class 1 Multiple connections allowed

Class 5 Undefined Class 6

Used in avionics
Behaves like Class 1

Class F Broadcast

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FC-3 and FC-4 levels

FC-3 level Common services Currently under development FC-4 level Mapping Between lower levels of Fibre Channel and the command sets that use Fibre Channel Standards for: SCSI-3 IP IPI HIPPI

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ATM-AAL5 FC-LE SBCCS IEEE 802.2

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Fibre Channel cables

Copper

Optical (glass fiber)

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Single-mode fiber
Highest bandwidth and lowest performance loss
One coherent stream of light travels a single path Long-wave lasers Single-mode, step-index fiber

9 Micron Diameter
Cladding 125 Micron

Core

Single-Mode

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Single-mode step-index fiber

The preferred medium for long-distance telecommunications

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Multi-mode fiber
Multiple streams of light to travel different paths Most popular for networking

50/62.5 Micron Diameter

Core

Cladding 125 Micron

Multimode

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Multi-mode step-index fiber

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Multimode graded-index fiber

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Attenuation
Loss of power as a signal travels over a distance Specified in decibels per kilometer (dB/km) Lessened with higher-quality, more expensive, single mode fibers Greater with lower quality, less expensive, multimode fibers

Results from:
Light absorption caused by material impurities Light scattering caused by material impurities or by the defects at the core/cladding interface, and by the scattering of the molecules of the medium Macro bends Micro bends

Scattering and reflection at cable splices

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Dispersion
Degree of scattering of the light beam as it travels

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Micro-bending
Scattering because the cable is bent beyond 3cm
No bends less than ten times the outer diameter of the cable

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Macro-bending
Physical bending of fiber cable past the specified radius

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Fibre Channel ISL SAN extensions

Reasons for extension
Business continuance in case of site failure Geographically distributed multisite SAN support
Intersite file sharing Remote backup Centralized servers or storage

HP supports
Multi-protocol long-distance technology, including:
FCIP FC-SONET Fibre Channel over ATM

Fibre Channel long-distance technologies

Long-wave transceivers WDM Extended fabric settings for Fibre Channel switches
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Fibre Channel over IP

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Wavelength division multiplexing

Combines and transmits multiple simultaneous signals at different wavelengths on the same fiberone fiber transports multiple data streams Protocol- and bit-rate-independent
Fibre Channel IP ATM SONET/SDH Ethernet

Bit rates between 100Mb/s and 2.5Gb/s Transparent to the switchesdo not count as an additional hop Supported for both 1Gb/s and 2Gb/s

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Long-wave transceivers GBIC or SFP

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Learning check

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