Does Windows have native Fibre Channel initiator?

Question

I'm new to Fibre Channel and I'm aware that Windows has a native iSCSI initiator. However, I couldn't find something similar for Fibre Channel. Is it all done with third-party software from the manufacturers?

Answer 1

There cannot be a software initiator fully implemented for FC, unlike iSCSI. iSCSI operates over TCP, so the iSCSI protocol that is fully implemented in software can be carried by TCP software on the host over a NIC card that connects to the Ethernet LAN.

The FC protocol stack is made up of layers FC-0 through FC-4. FC-0 defines the physical interface link to the FC SAN - so clocking, speed negotiation etc. happen at this layer. FC-1 defines encoding/decoding of data. FC-2 does the bulk of the protocol work, i.e the framing and signalling, etc. FC-3 defines common services for the FC SAN. FC-4 maps upper level protocols like SCSI into FC-2 frames.

The FC-2 protocol is typically implemented by firmware in Host Bus Adapter cards (HBA's) that are attached to the server's PCIe bus. FC-0 and FC-1 are typically handled by ASICs and transceivers on the HBA card. Software drivers on the host typically implement FC-4 by transporting the SCSI commands from upper level storage drivers (for targets like disks, tape etc.) through the HBA (but AFAIK it is not always necessary to have FC-4 implemented in host drivers).

However iSCSI HBA's are available where the iSCSI/TCP protocol implementation is offloaded into the HBA so that there is lower CPU utilization on the host for the processing of the iSCSI protocol.