HP 3PAR Simulator

*** UPDATE – PLEASE SEE MY LATEST POST DETAILING DEPLOYMENT OF THE 3PAR SIMULATOR ***

*** ON VMWARE ESXI – https://www.bytesizedalex.com/hp-3par-simulator-deployment-on-vmware-vsphere-esxi/  ***

*** ON VMWARE WORKSTATION – https://www.bytesizedalex.com/hp-3par-simulator-deployment-on-vmware-workstation/  ***

*** Configuration of Remote Copy over IP (RCIP) – https://www.bytesizedalex.com/hp-3par-simulator-remote-copy-rcip/   ***

Currently downloading the HP 3PAR simulator – really can’t wait to get this thing up and running. At work I have two 7400 arrays (dual controllers) with a 3 tier mix of SSD, FC and NL.

While it would be awesome to have physical kit to use as a lab that isn’t going to happen so simulator all the way. I must say I am glad to see HP providing a simulator, NetApp have done so for quite a while and it was always beneficial. I believe EMC also have a simulator for their VNX range which is something I may look into.

For those of you who may be interested in the 3PAR simulator please speak with your HP rep or partner.

The following information comes from the HP simulator release notes –

Supported Platform

The 3PAR Simulator software release version 2.0 supports the configuration of up to 2 simultaneous instances, differentiated by name and serial number, of a 2-node HP 3PAR StoreServ P7000 Storage System running HP 3PAR OS version 3.1.3 build 230.

Supported Features

The following 3PAR StoreServ Storage System features are supported:
• Up to 48 HDDs, 4 cage configuration
• Cage types – DCN1, DCS1, DCS2
• Disk types – FC, SSD, NL
• 3PAR Management Console support
• CLI and Remote CLI support
• CIM-API (SMI-S) and WS-API support
• Storage Provisioning including Thin-Provisioning
• Exporting Virtual Volumes
• Adaptive Optimization (AO)
• Dynamic Optimization (DO)
• Local Replication (Snapshot)
• Remote Replication (RCIP) – requires 2 instances of the simulator ( Requires more resources )

System Requirements

The 3PAR Simulator requires a VMware ESXi 5.xr or a VMware Workstation 9 or 10 setup. The simulator configuration requires deploying three VMs; two VMs simulating the cluster nodes, a third VM to simulate the enclosure and private network configuration to enable communication between the three VMs.

The minimum system resources required for each VM are:
• One virtual CPU (single core)
• Three virtual NICs
• 2GB RAM
• 50GB disk space (full or thin-provisioned)
For deploying the 3PAR Simulator with RCIP, the VMs would require more resources. 4 GB of RAM is needed for each cluster node.

 

Obviously there is a requirement for VMware ESXi or Workstation but I imagine most people interested will have access to one of these. I intend to spin up a copy at home as well as in the office, hopefully if I have enough resource it will be a dual deployment with 2 instances but that may have to wait for me to expand my home lab environment as it’s pretty full.

14 thoughts on “HP 3PAR Simulator”

    • Hi JayBG,

      Could you give me a bit more info on what you’re trying to achieve? I deployed the 3PAR simulator and I know that the drive cages can be listed as ‘Degraded’ – if this is what you are trying to resolve then check out my post on this exact issue for a real 3PAR http://www.bytesizedalex.com/hp-3par-cage-degraded-and-the-upgradecage-command/

      It should be noted that I don’t think you can actually stream firmware in the simulator, the reference above is literally just for your info in case you have a physical 3PAR.

      I can look into this a bit more when I have a free moment but for now I’d suggest play with the simulator and don’t worry about the cages state.

      Alex Bytes

      Reply
  1. Hi Alex,

    How do I fix firmware issues. I fixed the failed drives, but I have tried the simulator on 2 different machine and still get firmware errors.

    Thanks.

    Reply
  2. Hi,

    I’m having the problem where during OOTB I get unexpected errors on my disks or degraded disks. OOTB fails on this that it can’t create the admin partition. Any ideas how to fix this. I’m using version 3.2.1.200.

    Thanks.

    Reply
    • Hi John,

      If possible take some screenshots and Tweet them to me (@bytesizedalex) so I can check out the exact message. I would suggest importing the virtual machines again for a fresh build and make sure the disk cage creation process goes OK and you have started ESD. Once that is done make sure all 3 VM network adapter 3 configurations are complete as they use this private network to communicate. Are you trying to do this on ESXi or Workstation?

      Alex Bytes

      Reply
  3. Hi Alex,

    Tweeted a screenshot. I’m running this on ESXi 5.5. The network setup I’ve done is indeed network adapter1 on a management network and adapter3 on a private network. When I ping from the ESD I can ping the nodes. Also when running ESD List I see that the nodes are connected. I already ran it several times on two instances but no luck so far.

    Regards,

    John

    Reply
    • Hi John,

      Hmm that looks normal to me – have you tried pressing C to continue? The simulator comes up with a warning message but it’s basically just saying if you don’t like the disk/cage layout now is the time to change it as after this step it will create the admin/meta volumes across whatever disk/cage layout you have chosen so there is no going back. I’d suggest trying to continue as I don’t see anything wrong in the screenshot.

      Alex

      Reply
    • Hi Tonecold,

      I’m not sure what you mean with regard to finding a torrent link? The simulator doesn’t exist as a torrent file (at least not legally). Access is via HP and requires a HP username and password which they provide.

      Regards,

      Alex

      Reply

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