Dell PowerVault MD3000 - Manual (Page 44)

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Using Your RAID Enclosure
• Enabling premium features before migration — Before migrating disk groups and virtual disks, enable
the required premium features on the destination storage array. If a disk group is migrated from a
storage array that has a premium feature enabled and the destination array does not have this feature
enabled, an
Out of Compliance error message can be generated. For specific procedures to
correct the error, refer to the Recovery Guru.
Disk Roaming
Moving physical disks within an array is called disk roaming. The RAID controller module automatically
recognizes the relocated physical disks and logically places them in the proper virtual disks that are part
of the disk group. Disk roaming is permitted whether the RAID controller module is either online or
powered off.
NOTE:
The disk group must be offline before moving the physical disks.
Advanced Features
The RAID enclosure supports several advanced features:
• Storage Partitioning, including host-to-virtual disk mapping
• Virtual Disk Snapshots
• Virtual Disk Copy
NOTE:
Virtual Disk Snapshot and Virtual Disk Copy are premium features that must be activated separately. If you
have purchased these features, an activation card is supplied that contains instructions for enabling this
functionality.
Storage Partitions
Storage partitioning enables hosts to share access to virtual disks in a storage array. A storage partition is
a logical entity consisting of one or more virtual disks that can be accessed by a single host or shared
among hosts that are part of a host group. To create a storage partition, you first define a host or host
group, then define a host-to-virtual disk mapping.
NOTE:
You must create a storage partition for each type of host.
Storage partitions give multiple hosts or host groups access to the same host-to-virtual disk mappings.
With these mappings, you can control which host or host group may have access to a virtual disk in your
storage array.
The first time you map a virtual disk to a specific host or host group, a storage partition is created. Any
subsequent mappings to that host or host group do not create new storage partitions.
Under the following conditions, only a single storage partition is required:
• You have only one attached host that will access all of the virtual disks in the storage array. A single host
can be attached to only one partition.