Netgear RN212 – 2 BAY Desktop ReadyNAS Storage Guida Al Software

An iSCSI initiator application lets you set up a connection from a server to a LUN group (and therefore to
individual LUNs). Normally, users would not initiate such a LUN connection. The network administrator
would provide access to a LUN group through a server.

The iSCSI targets (that is, the LUNs in the LUN group on the ReadyNAS) present themselves on the client
system as virtual block devices and can be treated as a locally attached disks. Windows, for instance, can
run FAT32 or NTFS on the iSCSI target device and treat the devices as though they were locally attached.

When they can access a LUN group, users can employ any backup application to back up local data from
their iSCSI-attached device to a LUN.

Unlike snapshots that reside on a share, snapshots that reside on a LUN are not visible
to users. For information about how to recover data using a snapshot on a LUN, see

 on page 111.

Accessing LUN groups from iSCSI-attached devices requires these high-level steps:

Set up iSCSI initiator access to the LUN group.
See 

 on page 92.

Initialize and format LUNs in the LUN group.
See 

 on page 97.

The following procedure uses the Microsoft iSCSI Software Initiator, which is freely available online and is
integrated in Windows 7 and later.

If you use an operating system other than Windows, the steps are different, but the
basic tasks remain the same.

Some of the steps in this procedure require that the Windows iSCSI service is running.
If it is not, when you open the iSCSI initiator, Windows asks if you want it started.