Testing Players Go SAN Blasting

As SANs get bigger and more complex, heftier test equipment is needed to build and maintain them. And recent releases of Fibre Channel SAN testers from Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE: A) and Spirent Communications are cases in point.

Both vendors make big router testers, and even though they've offered SAN test kit in the past, they say customers -- meaning equipment makers as well as enterprise and carrier users of SANs -- need more horsepower and connection analysis.

Router tester vendors are well suited to the task for several reasons. First, their hardware and software are capable of simulating and analyzing large interconnected, multiprotocol networks. In contrast, many Fibre Channel testers on the market today comprise software that runs on PC cards. These smaller fry aren't up to handling the massive scaleability suppliers are looking for, particularly in metro area networks, where carriers increasingly offer SAN services to multiple enterprises.

Router testers also are geared to simulating and analyzing many connections, such as those in big IP-based networks with lots of routers. SANs are getting more like these networks, sources say, and it's imperative to be able to factor many links into the test pool.

Agilent's 1730B SAN Tester emulates up to 2,000 devices in a Fibre Channel SAN, although it doesn't distinguish among switches, servers, or other particular types of gear, according to Jean-Manuel Dassonville, Agilent's SAN tester product manager.The 1730B is an adjunct to the vendor's RouterTester, which has 16 ports in its top configuration, but can be expanded to 32 by adding another chassis. Each of the 16 ports in the base configuration can be set up to mimic the traffic of up to 126 SAN devices. Users adjust the per-port number of devices downward as they wish, in what the vendor calls device virtualization. The new kit also tracks various performance characteristics in FC SANs, such as latency and lost frames. It costs $32,836.

Agilent says its new kit is aimed at the bigger scale that SAN vendors and users are seeking. "The size of the fabric almost doubles every year. We're seeing Fibre Channel fabrics now with thousands, not hundreds, of ports," says Dassonville.

SANs aren't just getting bigger. They're getting more complex. And that's where Spirent claims expertise. Its Storage Routing Tester (SRT), an add-on to the vendor's 238-port SmartBits Test System, is aimed not only at stress-testing big networks, but also analyzes traffic based on the Fiber Shortest Path First (FSPF) protocol used to route traffic in FC SANs. The SRT also simulates and tests so-called N links between switches and storage devices and E-port links between switches.

The SRT also has device virtualization, according to Spirent Communications VP of technical strategy Mark Fishburn. But customers, he says, also need the kinds of tests that go with a routed or switched Ethernet metro area network. "Customers need to do more than just stress a Fibre Channel switch," he says.

Agilent says it has no announcement of any pending addition of FSPF capability to the 1730B.Agilent and Spirent aren't the only tester vendors looking at big SANs these days. Ixia (Nasdaq: XXIA), which OEMs FC test kit from Xyratex, is looking to create its own product supporting larger SANs.

Some smaller players may also start looking to get a piece of the action. Brad Heykoop, CFO of Tabernus LLC, which makes software that diagnoses and tests specific functions of storage devices, says his company is looking into creating products that test the connections in Fibre Channel SANs, not just the particular ports associated with switches and servers.

"Our sense is that customers want equipment that tests the fabric of a SAN," he says, noting that the involvement of big router vendors is in keeping with that demand.

Mary Jander, Senior Editor, Light Reading