Vdisk Expansion Recommendations; Allocate "Quiet" Period(S) To Help Optimize Vdisk Expansion; Re-Create The Vdisk With Additional Capacity And Restore Data - HP P2000 G3 MSA Technical White Paper

Technical white paper | HP P2000 G3 MSA
Note
Once a Vdisk expansion initiates it will continue until completion or until the Vdisk is deleted.

Vdisk Expansion Recommendations

Before expanding a Vdisk, review the information below to understand the best alternative method for allocating additional
storage to hosts.

Allocate "quiet" period(s) to help optimize Vdisk expansion

This method of expansion utilizes the expand capability of the system and requires manual intervention from the
administrator to get the best possible performance from the expansion.
In this context, a "quiet" period indicates a length of time when there is no Host I/O or data access to the system.
Follow the procedure below
Procedure:
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When expansion is complete or data access needs to be restored:
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If additional "quiet" periods are required:
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Vdisk expansion can take a few hours with no data access for smaller capacity hard drives (72 GB) and may take several
days to complete with larger capacity hard drives (2 TB). This procedure can be paused by reconnecting the host side cables
and restarting hosts. Priority is given to Host I/O or data access over the expansion process during normal array operation.
While the system is responding to Host I/O or data access requests, it may seem as if the expansion process has stopped.
When expanding during "quiet" periods, expansion time is minimized and will allow quicker restoration of other disk utilities.

Re-create the Vdisk with additional capacity and restore data

This method is the easiest and fastest method for adding additional capacity to a Vdisk. The online Vdisk initialization allows
a user to access the Vdisk almost immediately and will complete quicker than the expansion process on a Vdisk that is also
servicing data requests.
Follow the procedure below
Procedure:
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3.
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5.
Consult the "Virtual disks" section for Best Practices when creating Virtual Disks.
Backup the current data from the existing Vdisk.
Shutdown all hosts connected to the P2000 G3 system.
Label and disconnect host side cables from the P2000 G3 system.
Using the WBI or CLI, start the Vdisk expansion.
Monitor the Vdisk expansion percentage complete.
Re-connect host side cables to the P2000 G3 system.
Restart hosts connected to the P2000 G3 system.
Shutdown all hosts connected to the P2000 G3 system.
Label and disconnect host side cables from the P2000 G3 system.
Monitor the Vdisk expansion percentage complete.
Backup the current data from the existing Vdisk.
Delete the current Vdisk.
Using the WBI or CLI, create a new Vdisk with the available hard drives.
Create a volume.
Restore data to the new volume.
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