Hello Max, on System z there are currently two supported protocols for FC attached devices (like the TS3200): 'switched fabric' or 'point to point'. Arbitrated loop is not implemented. This means you can in principle operate small devices without a switch directly connected to the fibre channel ports of the machine. But there are some restrictions if you do this:
- As the name says, 'point to point' means a direct connection between a fibre channel port of the machine and a fibre channel port of the device. Therefore you have to use one port on the machine for every tape drive in your library and (I don't know this library model exactly) sometimes an extra port for the changer device. This will use up all available ports with a small number of devices. - In addition you give up functionality. With the z9 you can use a feature called N_Port ID Virtualization. This feature creates 'virtual' ports so that e.g. every Linux VM guest seems to have its own port in the fibre channel network behind the switch. Without this fearure the possibilities to share a port between several Linux guests are very limited. For these reasons nobody would recommend such a setup for more than a very small environment. best regards Michael --- Michael Loehr Linux for zSeries Development IBM, Mainz, Germany ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For LINUX-390 subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: INFO LINUX-390 or visit http://www.marist.edu/htbin/wlvindex?LINUX-390
