Connectivity - HP XP20000/XP24000 Operation Manual

Connectivity

The storage system supports all-mainframe, all-open-system, and multi-platform configurations. The
CHAs process the channel commands from the hosts and manage host access to cache. In the
mainframe environment, the channel adapters (CHAs) perform CKD-to-FBA and FBA-to-CKD conversion
for the data in cache.
Each CHA feature (pair of boards) is composed of one type of host channel interface: FICON/zHPF,
Extended Serial Adapter (ExSA) (compatible with ESCON protocol), or Fibre Channel Protocol (FCP).
The channel interfaces on each board can transfer data simultaneously and independently.
The FICON/zHPF and fibre-channel CHA features are available in shortwave (multimode) and
longwave (single-mode) versions.
FICON/zHPF: The same FICON CHAs are used for FICON and FICON/zHPF. The FICON CHAs
provide data transfer speeds of up to 400 MB/sec (4 Gbps) and have 8 ports per feature (pair
of boards). The CHPID must be set as the FC type in the hardware configuration definition.
FICON data transmission rates vary according to configuration:
S/390 Parallel Enterprise Servers - Generation 5 (G5) and Generation 6 (G6) only support
FICON at 1 Gbps.
z800 and z900 series hosts have the following possible configurations:
FICON channel will operate at 1 Gbps only.
FICON EXPRESS channel transmission rates will vary according to microcode release. If
microcode is 3G or later, the channel will auto-negotiate to set a 1 Gbps or 2-Gbps trans-
mission rate. If microcode is previous to 3G, the channel will operate at 1 Gbps only.
z9 and z10 series hosts have the following possible configurations:
FICON channel will operate at 1/2/4 Gbps (by auto-negotiation process).
FICON EXPRESS4 is supported in z9/z10 series.
FICON channel will auto-negotiate to set a 1 or 2 or 4 Gbps transmission rate.
z10 series and z196 hosts support:
FICON Express8
FICON channel auto-negotiates to set a 2, 4, or 8 Gbps transmission rate.
When configured with shortwave (multimode) FICON CHAs, the storage system can be located
according to the following:
Multimode 62.5 um cable: 300m (1 Gbps), 150m (2 Gbps), 75m (4 Gbps)
Multimode 50 um cable: 500m (1 Gbps), 300m (2 Gbps), 150m (4 Gbps)
When configured with longwave (single-mode) FICON CHAs, the storage system can be located
according to the following:
Single-mode 9 um cable: 10km, 20km with RPQ
ESCON: The ExSA features provide data transfer speeds of up to 17 MB/sec and have 8 ports
per feature (pair of boards). Each ExSA channel can be directly connected to a CHPID or a serial
channel director. Shared serial channels can be used for dynamic path switching. The storage
system also supports the ESCON Extended Distance Feature.
Fibre Channel: Fiber-channel connectivity is supported for IBM mainframe attachment when host
FICON/zHPF channel paths are defined to operate in FCP mode. The fibre-channel CHAs provide
data transfer speeds of up to 4 Gbps and can have either 8 or 16 ports per CHA pair (pair of
boards). The storage system supports shortwave (multimode) and longwave (single-mode) versions
of fibre-channel ports on the same CHA.
8 Overview of mainframe operations