A host is a server that sends I/O to a volume on a storage array. A host cluster is a group of hosts. You create a host cluster to make it easy to assign the same volumes to multiple hosts.

You need to create a host cluster if you want to have two or more hosts share access to the same set of volumes. Normally, the individual hosts have clustering software installed on them to coordinate volume access.

The Host Operating System Type field contains the operating system of the host. You can select the recommended host type from the drop-down list or allow the Host Context Agent (HCA) to configure the host and appropriate host operating system type.

A host bus adapter (HBA) is a board that resides in a host and contains one or more host ports. A host port is a port on a host bus adapter (HBA) that provides the physical connection to a controller and is used for I/O operations.

If you are manually creating a host, you first must use the appropriate host bus adapter (HBA) utility available on the host to determine the host port identifiers associated with each HBA installed in the host.

If you set up Challenge Handshake Authentication Protocol (CHAP) authentication on any iSCSI host connected to the storage array, you must re-enter that initiator CHAP secret for each iSCSI host. To do this, you can use System Manager either as part of the Create Host operation or through the View/Edit Settings option.

The default cluster is a system-defined entity that allows any unassociated host bus adapter (HBA) host port identifier that has logged into the storage array to gain access to any volumes assigned to the default cluster. An unassociated host port identifier is a host port that while physically installed in a host and logged into the storage array is not logically associated with a particular host.