Book Image

Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions

Book Image

Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions

Overview of this book

Cisco Unified Computing System(UCS) provides unique features for the contemporary data centres. Cisco UCS is a unified solution that consolidates computing, network and storage connectivity components along-with centralized management. Cisco UCS reduces TCO and improves scalability and flexibility. Stateless computing blade server's design simplifies the troubleshooting, and Cisco-patented extended memory technology provides higher virtualized servers consolidation results. A hands-on guide to take you through deployment in Cisco UCS. With real-world examples for configuring and deploying Cisco UCS components, this book will prepare you for the practical deployments of Cisco UCS data centre solutions. If you want to learn and enhance your hands-on skills with Cisco UCS solutions, this book is certainly for you. Starting with the description of Cisco UCS equipment options, this hands-on guide then introduces Cisco UCS Emulator which is an excellent resource to practically learn Cisco UCS components' deployment. You will also be introduced to all areas of UCS solutions with practical configuration examples. You will also discover the Cisco UCS Manager, which is the centralized management interface for Cisco UCS. Once you get to know UCS Manager, the book dives deeper into configuring LAN, SAN, identity pools, resource pools, and service profiles for the servers. The book also presents other administration topics including Backup, Restore, user's roles, and high availability cluster configuration. Finally, you will learn about virtualized networking, 3rd party integration tools and testing failure scenarios. You will learn everything you need to know for the rapidly growing Cisco UCS deployments in the real-world.
Table of Contents (19 chapters)
Implementing Cisco UCS Solutions
Credits
About the Authors
About the Reviewer
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Understanding the physical architecture of UCS


The Cisco UCS solution can be divided into the following three main categories:

  • The Cisco UCS FIs

  • The Cisco UCS blade servers

  • The Cisco UCS rack-mount servers

The Cisco UCS FIs

The Cisco UCS FIs provide network connectivity and management for the connected servers. The UCS FIs run the UCSM control software and consist of the following components:

  • 6100 series and 6200 series FIs

  • Transceivers for network and storage connectivity

  • Expansion modules for both FI series

  • UCSM software

The Cisco UCS blade servers

The Cisco UCS blade servers require a mother chassis where these servers can be installed. The UCS blade server solution consists of the following components:

  • A blade server chassis, used for installing blades

  • B-series blade servers

  • IOM modules for connectivity to the FIs

  • Transceivers for connectivity to the FIs

  • Mezzanine cards for network and storage connectivity

The Cisco UCS rack-mount servers

The Cisco UCS rack-mount servers are standalone servers that can be installed and controlled individually. Cisco provides Fabric Extenders (FEXs) for the rack-mount servers. FEXs can be used to connect and manage rack-mount servers from FIs. The UCS rack-mount server solution consists of the following components:

  • UCS C-series rack-mount servers

  • FEXs for connecting rack-mount servers to FIs

In this chapter we will provide details about hardware options available for both blade servers and rack-mount servers. Most of the field deployments of UCS servers are based on blade servers. Therefore, our main focus will be on blade server configuration in this book. However, if proper connectivity is established between rack-mount servers and FIs, rack-mount servers can also be managed in the same fashion.

The following figure depicts the FIs running the UCSM software, a blade server chassis with IOM modules, and the main components of a blade server:

In this chapter, we will go into the details of various UCS components and will focus on their physical specifications and installation in the subsequent sections.

Note

The Cisco interactive 3D model for Cisco 5100 series chassis and blades is an excellent resource for exploring Cisco UCS components physically. It is also available for iPhone/iPad (search for UCS Tech Specs in the marketplace). More details on this are available at http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/ps10265/ps10279/ucs_kaon_model_preso.html.