[Linux-cluster] Low cost storage for clusters

[Brendan Heading]

Patton, Matthew F, CTR, OSD-PA&E wrote:

> use Jumbo frames and thruput might be much better. Then again I don't 
> know how iSCSI generates packets. I hope it's not 1 packet per disk 
> block which is typically 512bytes. presumably how many disk blocks / 
> packet is a (auto-)tunable parameter.

I don't know how much of it is tunable. I have to say that I'm very 
suspicious about the idea of using TCP/IP and all that goes with it to 
shift disk blocks around. Web servers and higher-latency comms, I can 
get. But disk blocks with millisecond access times I don't. I'm trying 
to be objective though, and the consensus is that it seems to work quite 
well.

> switch price matters. But some of the cheepies claim features that the 
> big-names charge 10x as much for which doesn't make sense. I never pay 
> the Cisco tax unless there is a gun to my head.

Well said. But I'm still suspicious. You can get a no-name 24-port 
web-managed gigabit ethernet switch from Dell for UKP236 at the moment, 
and that's with two SFPs. There are some people who want several grand 
for the same number of ports. There's got to be something in it other 
than an SNMP interface ?