Scenario:
A large financial brokerage firm transacts about 32% of trades in the SouthAmerican
market.It offers brokerage services, investment banking, and financial advisory servicesto
corporations and individuals Recent expansions into other worldwide markets have led to
delays mprocessing trading datainto usablereports that are timely enough for consumption
by traders.The companyis seeking a way to give traders much closer real-time data touse
when making decisionson trades, ultimately translating intohigher results for its customers
and higher competitive advantage for the firmcompany is projecting 100% data growth rates
annually for the foreseeablefuture.A recentpower outage at the productiondata center that
lasted 24 hours resulted in significant data loss.The production data center:
All rack-mount servers
Microsoft SQL Server 2000
HP ProLiant DL385 servers
Two HP Enterprise Virtual Array 6400 SANs
Heterogeneous SAN environment consisting of HP B-series and HP C-series
SANs
The on campus Disaster Recovery Center is newly constructed and has not been configured
or brought on line:
BladeSystem environment
Core edge design
All HP B-series
HP 3PAR StoreServ Storage System
The company pulls all of its trading information and data into a warehouse and then runs
reports on the data internal reports determine whether to update asset allocation. Customer
reports detail current holding and earnings of the firm’s funds. The most complex reports
takes 36 hours to run an can only be run over the weekend to prevent disruption to
operations; this results in traders receiving updated information only per week.There is also
an option for customers to access web-based reports, and there is a need to update these
reports more frequently as well. Some of the additional business criteria identifiedin
customerplanning interviews includes:

Produce daily reports rather than weekly
Close to real time reporting to customers
Scalable solution for further growth and without interruption
Ability to add additional reports or analyze in new ways as the need arises
Reduced IT overtime
Concerned about application disruptions when adding or removing SAN devices
Manage multiple fiber Channel ports as one switch resource
Move from 4GB SAN to an 8GB Fibre Channel SAN.
Looking for optional performance, less downtime, non-disruption expansion, and a
Low price per port on the FC Switch deployment
Consolidation of SANs for seamless sharing of server storage resources
Multiple solutions, prioritized with recommendation
Refer to the scenario.
Which network topology optimally meets the stated requirements?

A.
core-edge

B.
cascaded

C.
ring

D.
mesh

Explanation:
http://h20628.www2.hp.com/km-ext/kmcsdirect/emr_na-c00403562-57.pdf
Single-switch fabric Benefits
The benefits of a single-switch fabric include:
• Easy installation and configuration of servers and storage
• Maximum fabric performance because all communicating devices connect to the same
switch
• Support for local, centralized, and distributed data access needs
Cascaded fabric Benefits
The benefits of a cascaded fabric include:
• Ability to connect SANs in diverse geographic locations
• Ease of scalability for increased server and storage connectivity
• Shared backup and management support
• Optimum local performance when communicating devices are connected to the same
switchin the cascaded fabric
• Cost efficiency due to the large number of switch ports available
• Support for local data access and occasional centralized data access
Meshed fabric Benefits
The benefits of a meshed fabric include:
• Ability to meet multiple data access needs
• Multiple paths for internal fabric resiliency
• Ease of scalability
• Shared backup and management support
• Support for a mix of local and distributed data access
• Less impact on performance due to intra-switch traffic
Ring fabric Benefits
The benefits of a ring fabric include:

• Modular design and ease of scalability by adding a switch and other devices
• Multiple paths for internal fabric resiliency
• Support for a mix of local data access and occasional centralized data access
Core-edge fabric Benefits
The benefits of a core-edge fabric include:
• Typically, a maximum of two hops between switches
• Equal, centralized access to devices in the core
• Increased fabric and switch redundancy with two or more switches in the core
• Full many-to-many connectivity with evenly distributed bandwidth
• Support for centralized and distributed data access needs
• Ability to designate an optimally located