350-601 Storage Network Practice Test 5 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A storage engineer is planning to migrate from an existing 2 Gbps Fibre Channel fabric to a new 16 Gbps fabric while maintaining connectivity during the cutover. The legacy and new switches are connected via ISL and use the same VSAN. What is a best practice to ensure a seamless migration?

Accepted Answer

Set the ISL port speed to 2 Gbps on both sides until the migration is complete. Option B is correct because setting the ISL port speed to 2 Gbps on both sides ensures that the new 16 Gbps switch negotiates down to the legacy fabric's speed, preventing buffer-to-buffer credit mismatches and frame corruption during the cutover. This allows both fabrics to operate at a common speed, maintaining stable connectivity until all devices are migrated and the ISL speed can be safely increased.

Answer

Assign the new switches to a separate VSAN to prevent mixing

Answer

Use a dedicated ISL for the migration and move zones gradually

Answer

Disable zoning on both fabrics and re-apply after migration

Question 2

During an FCoE deployment, the server team reports that hosts can reach the storage array but performance is intermittent with periodic timeouts. The network team sees no errors on the FCoE VLAN. The DCB configuration on the upstream switch shows that PFC is enabled for CoS 3. What should the engineer check next?

Accepted Answer

Check if the PFC configuration matches on both ends and that PFC is enabled on the FCoE VLAN interfaces. D is correct because PFC (Priority Flow Control) must be consistently configured on both ends of an FCoE link to prevent frame loss. If PFC is enabled for CoS 3 on the upstream switch but not on the server's vNIC or the FCoE VLAN interfaces, the lack of lossless behavior causes intermittent timeouts and performance degradation, even if the FCoE VLAN shows no errors.

Answer

Verify that jumbo frames are enabled on the storage array

Answer

Confirm that the VSAN is appropriately sized for the number of hosts

Answer

Ensure that the FCoE VLAN is enabled for FCoE on the server's vNIC

Question 3

A company is deploying a new storage array with dual controllers. Each controller has two 16 Gbps Fibre Channel ports. The engineer wants to connect each controller to two separate MDS switches for redundancy. What is the recommended port type configuration on the MDS switches for the storage-facing ports?

Accepted Answer

F port. Storage array ports typically operate as target ports, so the switch ports should be configured as F ports (fabric ports). Option A is correct. Option B (E port) is for ISL. Option C (NP port) is for NPV. Option D (auto) may work but not recommended.

Answer

Configure the port as auto to allow negotiation

Answer

NP port

Answer

E port

Question 4

Which TWO of the following Fibre Channel port types are used to connect end devices such as hosts or storage?

Accepted Answer

N port. Port types: N port (host) and F port (switch facing host) connect end devices. E port is for ISL, NP port for NPV, and FL port for loop. Options A and D are correct. Options B, C, and E are incorrect.

Answer

FL port

Answer

E port

Answer

NP port

Question 5

Which THREE of the following are required for a successful FCoE deployment on a Cisco MDS switch?

Accepted Answer

Enable the FCoE feature globally. FCoE requires: enable FCoE feature, configure a VSAN for FCoE, and ensure DCB with PFC is configured. FIP snooping is optional but not required for basic operation. Jumbo frames are necessary but not a switch config step. Options A, B, and D are correct. Options C and E are not mandatory.

Answer

Enable FIP snooping on the FCoE VLAN

Answer

Set the MTU to 9216 bytes on all FCoE interfaces

Question 6

Which THREE of the following are best practices for Fibre Channel zoning on Cisco MDS switches?

Accepted Answer

Make zones as specific as possible, avoiding device inclusion across multiple zones unnecessarily. Zoning best practices: use WWPN zoning for stability, use read-only zone sets for audit, and minimize zone aliasing for clarity. Option A (hard zoning) is correct but not a best practice per se; hard zoning is default. The best practices are options B, C, and D. Option E (soft zoning) is less secure.

Answer

Use hard zoning (access control list enforcement)

Answer

Use soft zoning with name server response filtering

Question 7

Refer to the exhibit. A server connected to interface fc1/3 on the MDS switch cannot log in to the fabric. The server's HBA WWPN is 10:00:00:00:c9:2b:1a:62. What is the most likely reason for the login failure?

Accepted Answer

Interface fc1/3 is not assigned to VSAN 100. The FLOGI database shows logins on fc1/1, fc1/2, and fc1/4, but no entry for fc1/3. The WWPN is not listed, indicating it never logged in. The most common cause is that the port is not in the same VSAN (100) or not configured correctly. Since other ports on the same switch show VSAN 100, likely fc1/3 is in a different VSAN or not enabled. Option C is correct. Option A (zoning) would show FLOGI but then reject. Option B (NPIV) not relevant. Option D (speed) would cause errors but not missing FLOGI.

Answer

NPIV is disabled on the port

Answer

The server's WWPN is not in the active zone set

Answer

The link speed is mismatched between switch and HBA

Question 8

Refer to the exhibit. A server with WWPN 10:00:00:00:c9:2b:1a:5f is zoned to two storage ports in zone Server1_Storage1 and to one storage port in zone Server1_Storage2. The server can access the LUNs through the first zone but not through the second. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The second zone does not include the second storage controller's port. The second zone Server1_Storage2 only has the server and one storage port. The server should have also a member for the second storage controller path. Option D best fits: the zone is missing the other storage controller's WWPN. Option A (zone set activation) unlikely as the other zone works. Option B (multiple zones per server) is fine. Option C (VSAN mismatch) not indicated.

Answer

The storage port 20:00:00:00:c9:2b:1a:6c is in a different VSAN

Answer

The zone set has not been activated

Answer

The server is not allowed to be in multiple zones

Question 9

Refer to the exhibit. An engineer is troubleshooting poor FCoE performance. The exhibit shows output from the FCoE interface. Which observation indicates a potential issue?

Accepted Answer

PFC frames received is high compared to PFC frames sent. PFC frames received (152) with zero sent suggests the interface is receiving pause frames from the peer, possibly due to congestion or a PFC configuration mismatch. Option B is correct. Option A (CRC errors) none. Option C (mode) is fine. Option D (MTU) default 1500 for data frames is consistent.

Answer

The CRC error count is zero

Answer

Data frames are 1500 bytes, which is too small for FCoE

Answer

The admin port mode is F instead of NP

Question 10

An engineer notices that the LED of an FC interface is off on a Cisco MDS switch. The interface is up/up. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The link is up but the LED is disabled in software configuration.. On Cisco MDS switches, the interface LED can be administratively disabled via the `no led` command in interface configuration mode, even when the interface is fully operational (up/up). This allows operators to selectively turn off LEDs for troubleshooting or to reduce visual noise in a data center, without affecting traffic. The LED being off while the interface shows up/up directly points to this software-based LED disablement.

Answer

The port LED firmware is corrupted.

Answer

The interface is administratively down.

Answer

The SFP is faulty.

Question 11

A storage administrator needs to configure zoning while minimizing administrative overhead and allowing multiple initiators to access multiple targets without having to change zones when new members are added. Which zoning approach is best?

Accepted Answer

Zoning by naming using a zone alias for initiators and another for targets. Option A is correct because zoning by name using zone aliases decouples the zone configuration from the physical port or WWN, allowing administrators to group initiators and targets into separate aliases. When new members are added to an alias, the zone automatically includes them without manual zone reconfiguration, minimizing administrative overhead while supporting multiple initiators and multiple targets.

Answer

Multiple initiator-multiple target zoning (all devices in one zone)

Answer

Single initiator-single target zoning

Answer

Single initiator-multiple target zoning (initiator-based)

Question 12

A Cisco MDS switch is configured as an NPV switch to connect to a core switch. Which statement about NPV operation is true?

Accepted Answer

The NPV switch uses FDISC to register multiple N-Port IDs from a single physical link.. In N_Port Virtualization (NPV) mode, a Cisco MDS switch acts as a passthrough device that aggregates multiple end-device N_Ports onto a single uplink to a core Fibre Channel switch. The NPV switch uses the Fabric Discovery (FDISC) protocol to register multiple N_Port IDs (NPIV) from a single physical link, allowing each end device to obtain its own FC ID from the core switch. This is correct because NPV does not assign FC IDs itself but relies on the core switch for fabric login and address assignment.

Answer

The NPV switch allocates FC IDs to end devices from its own pool.

Answer

The NPV switch requires at least one VSAN to be defined as a fabric VSAN.

Answer

The NPV switch performs fabric login (FLOGI) on behalf of all attached end devices.

Question 13

An engineer needs to create a VSAN on a Cisco MDS switch with VSAN ID 50. Which command correctly creates the VSAN?

Accepted Answer

switch(config)# vsan 50. Option A is correct. 'vsan <id>' in global config creates the VSAN. Option D is not complete.

Answer

switch(config-vsan)# vsan 50

Answer

switch(config)# interface vsan 50

Answer

switch(config)# vsan database

Question 14

In an FCoE deployment, a storage administrator needs to ensure that FCoE traffic is carried over a dedicated VLAN. Which configuration is required on a Cisco Nexus switch?

Accepted Answer

Enable FIP snooping and map the FCoE VLAN to a VSAN.. Option B is correct. FIP snooping and VSAN mapping are required for FCoE VLAN. Other options are incorrect.

Answer

Configure the VLAN as a private VLAN.

Answer

Assign the VLAN as an access VLAN to the interface.

Answer

Configure the VLAN as a native VLAN on the FCoE interface.

Question 15

On a Cisco MDS 9700, an engineer configures an FC port channel with 4 member interfaces. The connected storage array also supports port channels. Which load-balancing algorithm provides the best distribution of I/O when the array uses multiple LUNs per target?

Accepted Answer

Source FC ID (OXID) and destination FC ID (RXID). Option B is correct because per-exchange load balancing distributes I/Os between same initiator-target pair, ideal for multiple LUNs. Other options may not distribute well.

Answer

Source ID (SID) and Destination ID (DID)

Answer

Source and destination port ID

Answer

Source and destination WWPN