Load balancing with Fibre Channel
With network load balancing consisting of three servers (Windows 2003) for 600 users who will mostly access their office files (Outlook, etc.) on Clarion CX400, is it best to have a Fibre connection directly from the servers to Clarion via a Fibre Channel switch or using a NAS gateway?

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Well, the best performance will probably be with a direct FC connection. Given that you only have three servers, it might be your most economical solution as well. I would probably recommend that given those conditions.

Randy Kerns

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This was first published in March 2004