ISCSI Setup Series Part One: QNAP TurboNAS 3.7 Configuration

QNAP’s TurboNAS firmware supports ISCSI target functionality.  In Part One of my two-part ISCSI Setup Series, I show you the QNAP TurboNAS configuration.  Read on for details.

QNAP’s TurboNAS supports ISCSI, meaning that you can point a server at the QNAP’s RAID storage and use it over ethernet as if it is attached to the server.  This is particularly useful in scenarios where you have virtualized the server and want to use storage that is not attached to the virtual box.  Here, I walk you through setting up the ISCSI target on the QNAP and establishing a connection with Server 2012 Essentials Beta set up in a Hyper-V instance on Windows 8 Consumer Preview.  See this article for the Hyper-V setup instructions.  Ready?  Let’s go!

Hardware Used

I have a QNAP TS-419 P II NAS unit connected via ethernet to my home network.  The QNAP is running TurboNAS 3.7 and is using 8TB of drives in a RAID5 configuration.  I also have an HP HPE490t Elite desktop, with a motherboard that supports virtualization.  I have activated the virtualization option in the HP’s BIOS.  Windows 7 and WIndows 8 Consumer Preview are both loaded in a dual-boot configuration.  Hyper-V is loaded on the Windows 8 OS and Server 2012 Essentials is loaded inside Hyper-V as a virtual machine.

Configuration of the QNAP

We need to do some work to configure the QNAP to act as an ISCSI target.  The steps are activating ISCSI, creating the target, and setting up the server application to use the target.  We’ll cover the first two steps in this article.

First, log into the administrative panel of the QNAP.

Click on Disk Management and then ISCSI. Select Enable iSCSI Target Service. Click Apply.

Click OK as we’ll take care of that setting in a later step.

Click Target Management, OK to start the wizard. Select iSCSI Target with a mapped LUN. Click Next.

The ISCSI Quick Configuration Wizard launches.  Click Next.

Continue Reading « Previous 1 2 Next »