Management Console; Ethernet Switches; Processor Nodes; I/O Enclosures - IBM DS8880 Series Introduction And Planning Manual

Management console

The management console is also referred to as the Hardware Management Console
(or HMC). It supports storage system hardware and firmware installation and
maintenance activities. The HMC includes a keyboard and monitor that are stored
on the left side of the base frame.
The HMC connects to the customer network and provides access to functions that
can be used to manage the storage system. Management functions include logical
configuration, problem notification, call home for service, remote service, and Copy
Services management. You can perform management functions from the DS8000
Storage Management GUI, DS command-line interface (DS CLI), or other storage
management software that supports the storage system.
Each base frame includes one HMC and space for a second HMC, which is
available as a separately orderable feature to provide redundancy.

Ethernet switches

The Ethernet switches provide internal communication between the management
consoles and the processor complexes. Two redundant Ethernet switches are
provided.

Processor nodes

The processor nodes drive all functions in the storage system. Each node consists
of a Power server that contains POWER8 processors and memory.

I/O enclosures

The I/O enclosure provides connectivity between the adapters and the processor
complex.
The I/O enclosure uses PCIe interfaces to connect I/O adapters in the I/O
enclosure to both processor nodes. A PCIe device is an I/O adapter or a processor
node.
To improve I/O operations per second (IOPS) and sequential read/write
throughput, the I/O enclosure is connected to each processor node with a
point-to-point connection.
The I/O enclosure contain the following adapters:
Flash interface connectors
Device adapters
Host adapters
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DS8880 Introduction and Planning Guide
Interface connector that provides PCIe cable connection from the I/O
enclosure to the High Performance Flash Enclosure Gen2.
PCIe-attached adapter with four 8 Gbps Fibre Channel arbitrated loop
(FC-AL) ports. These adapters connect the processor nodes to standard
drive enclosures and provide RAID controllers for RAID support.
An I/O enclosure can support up to 16 host ports. For example, if an
8-port adapter is used, then only 2 additional 4-port adapters can be
installed, or one more 8-port adapter. If only 8-port adapters are used, then
only 2 host adapters can be installed in each I/O enclosure. If only 4-port
adapters are used, then 4 host adapters can be installed in each I/O
enclosure.