PSC PSC Networking & Host Connectivity 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Which NVMe-oF transport protocols does Pure Storage FlashArray support?
- NVMe/RDMA (RoCE) only
- NVMe/TCP and NVMe/FC (Correct answer)
- NVMe/InfiniBand only
- NVMe/PCIe only
Correct answer: NVMe/TCP and NVMe/FC
FlashArray supports NVMe over Fabrics via both NVMe/TCP (over standard Ethernet) and NVMe/FC (over Fibre Channel), giving customers flexibility in transport choice.
Question 2: In NVMe-oF deployments on Pure Storage FlashArray, what concept replaces the traditional SCSI LUN for addressing storage objects?
- FC WWPN
- iSCSI IQN
- NVMe Namespace (Correct answer)
- SCSI LUN ID
Correct answer: NVMe Namespace
NVMe-oF uses namespaces (identified by namespace IDs within an NVMe subsystem) instead of SCSI LUNs to address storage objects on the target.
Question 3: What is the purpose of a Virtual IP (VIP) on a Pure Storage FlashArray iSCSI interface?
- Encrypting iSCSI traffic end-to-end
- Providing a single stable IP endpoint for iSCSI targets that can float between controllers (Correct answer)
- Load balancing across multiple physical ports using LACP
- Enabling jumbo frame negotiation
Correct answer: Providing a single stable IP endpoint for iSCSI targets that can float between controllers
A VIP floats between FlashArray controllers, providing a stable iSCSI target address that remains reachable even after a controller failover without reconfiguring host initiators.
Question 4: Which Pure Storage CLI command displays all registered hosts and their associated WWN/IQN initiator identifiers?
- purevolume list --connection
- purenetwork list --host
- purehost list (Correct answer)
- purearray list --hosts
Correct answer: purehost list
The 'purehost list' command outputs all configured host objects with their names, WWNs (FC), IQNs (iSCSI), or NQNs (NVMe-oF) registered on the array.
Question 5: What Pure Storage recommended practice helps prevent Fibre Channel fabric congestion when connecting high-throughput FlashArray ports?
- Disable all ISLs between switches
- Use a single-switch topology
- Provision adequate buffer-to-buffer credits and enforce QoS zoning policies (Correct answer)
- Disable NPIV on all switch ports
Correct answer: Provision adequate buffer-to-buffer credits and enforce QoS zoning policies
Pure Storage recommends configuring sufficient buffer-to-buffer credits on switch ports connected to FlashArray (which drives high bandwidth) and using QoS zoning to prevent congestion from impacting latency-sensitive workloads.
Question 6: Which Pure Storage FlashBlade connectivity protocol is used for NAS (file) workloads?
- iSCSI
- Fibre Channel
- NFS and SMB (Correct answer)
- NVMe-oF
Correct answer: NFS and SMB
FlashBlade serves NAS workloads over NFS (for Linux/Unix) and SMB (for Windows), providing high-throughput parallel file access across its distributed architecture.
PSC PSC Networking & Host Connectivity 2
Which NVMe-oF transport protocols does Pure Storage FlashArray support?