Which network requirement is critical for MetroCluster IP deployments?

MetroCluster IP deployments rely on synchronous data replication between sites. For every write I/O, an acknowledgment must be received from both the local and remote storage systems before the write is confirmed to the host. High network latency would introduce significant delays to every write operation, severely degrading application performance. Therefore, a low latency, high-bandwidth network connection between the two MetroCluster sites is a critical and mandatory requirement for the solution to function effectively and meet performance expectations.

Wireless access points: Wireless networks do not provide the required bandwidth, stability, or low latency for a synchronous storage interconnect.

Satellite networking: Satellite links have extremely high latency, making them fundamentally incompatible with the requirements of synchronous replication.

Serial connectivity: Serial connections are a legacy technology with insufficient bandwidth for modern storage replication traffic.

1. NetApp Technical Report TR-4705, "MetroCluster Solution Architecture and Design", Page 15, Section: "MetroCluster IP Network Requirements". "The round-trip time (RTT) between the two MetroCluster sites must be low."

2. NetApp Documentation, "MetroCluster IP installation and configuration", Section: "Network requirements for MetroCluster IP configurations". This section specifies the maximum allowed round-trip time (RTT) between sites, which is typically in the low milliseconds (e.g., <10ms).