Sun Microsystems FC Switch-8 and Switch-16 816-0830-12 - Manual (Page 33)

Chapter 1 Introduction 3
/devices/pci@f,4000/pci@4/SUNW,qlc@4/fp@0,0/ssd@w50020f200000225,0.
Old symbolic device name:
/dev/dsk/c4t3d0s2
New symbolic designation:
/dev/dsk/c4t50020f200000225d0s2.
On-Demand Node Creation
The number of storage devices that can be attached to a host can grow to the
thousands with the advent of SANs with native Fabric connectivity. Probing all these
devices at boot time and creating device nodes can increase the boot time greatly. In
addition, a host might not need access to all of the storage devices it can access.
The Sun StorEdge Network FC Switch-16, Version 3.0, no longer creates device
nodes for every storage device attached. Instead, device nodes are created on
demand by the administrator using the
cfgadm utility. The device nodes, once
created, are persistent accross reboots. The cfgadm utility, which provides on-
demand node creation, is described in greater detail in Chapter 9.
Fabric Connection of Hosts
Hosts can connect to switches in a Fabric topology, using F_Ports, allowing
construction of scalable, high performing SANs.
Cascading of Switches
Switches can now be cascaded to increase the distance between ports available in a
zone and across the entire SAN. Cascading of switches allows for distances of up to
ten kilometers between ports, supporting highly available, disaster-tolerant
configurations.
Higher Realized Bandwidth
Host connections to switch Fabric connections (F-Ports) and InterSwitch Links (ISLs)
are full duplex connections. On a one gigabit Fibre Channel link, this can provide an
aggregate two gigabits per second of bandwidth when I/Os are flowing in both
directions.