Hi all,
I started using rose-storage-7.19.npk on a CHR installed in a Proxmox hypervisor within my test lab, to explore the some of the interesting features announced for the RouterOS Enterprise (ROSE) RDS2216-2XG-4S-4XS-2XQ device.
The initial idea was to verify if RDS2216-2XG-4S-4XS-2XQ can be a good solution to replace a fiber-channel shared storage (HPE MSA 2050) in a 2-node-cluster (ESXi) in a VMware environment.
Apparently there is no way to setup a standard IQN for the target RDS2216, other that specifying the IQN as “slot” name. Although, this is not possible since the system ONLY accept 32 chars containing ONLY A-Z,0-9,“-”,“_”. With such constraints, it is not possible to define an iSCSI adapter in ESXi pointing to the RDS2216.
This is because VMware ESXi does indeed require iSCSI target identification to be done using the iSCSI Qualified Name (IQN), not the traditional SCSI device ID. This is because iSCSI, unlike older SCSI connections, relies on network identification for target discovery and connection. The iSCSI target IQN uniquely identifies the iSCSI target device, allowing ESXi to connect and use the storage.
I submitted a request (support ticket) for proper iSCSI IQN’s, explaining the issue just as you did (ESXi expects the correct format) and got a response that it would be looked at.
Their IQN currently is just the slot name (which works fine on Linux and RouterOS), but it needs the reverse FQDN-date format to be “enterprise-ready.”
Oh yes! I can confirm that setting any arbitrary string in “slot” iSCSI works like charm, in a generic Linux environment.
For example, in a test environment, I have created a 3 disk RAID5 whose slot name is “raid5-vm” and I have exported as iSCSI. On an external Linux (Debian) I can easily define an initiator and mount the remote (target) “raid5-vm” exported volume without problem.
I can’t wait for developers to release this fix. The RDS2216 is really an excellent product and I think is only an inch away to become an enterprise-ready solution.
Best regards.
