How to migrate volumes between 2 groups of equalogic

Question

Hello,

I have 2 groups of equalogic. One group with 2 PSM4110 which have end of warranty in 5 months and a second group with 2 new PS6210X.

For VMware , ii is not a big problem because there is a vmotion.

But I have 2 physical servers .Each server has 2 volumes on the first group.

My question ; how to migrate these volume from the first group to the second group.The 2 servers can be stopped during the opearation .In one server , i have Tivoli storage manager installed ( database data , database active log and storage pool ) .

Thanks

Sincerely

Lanto R.

lrasoanaivo · Answer

Thank for your response Yes the  new group is already used for  some VM. 2 * PS6210 =======2*S4048========2* PCM8024-K in chassis M1000e====PSM4110 Thanks Sincerely lanto

Dev Mgr · Answer

As you mentioned you have some VMs on the new group, have you considered moving the VMs from one storage location to another? For VMware it would be called 'storage vMotion', or for Hyper-V it would be called 'Live (storage) Migration'. It may require a certain minimum license tier to be able to do this (mainly; for VMware vSphere you need a minimum of the Standard license tier to move the VMs while they are running, but when shut down you can move any VM (from Virtual Center). The only troublesome VM would be the Virtual Center VM itself.

lrasoanaivo · Answer

Helo ,

For VM migration( vmotion) , I have the ncessary licence .I have already began migration for some VM but I I have stopped because I must find solution how to migrate volume for the 2 physical servers.

I'm not yet sure but I think that I'll break the new group of 2 PS6210X and I'll put them in the first group which contains the old PSM41110;

In this case , how to break the new group after removing the VM to the first group , then how to retire properly the 2 PSM41110 in this group. I have yet 5 months of warranty for the 2 PSM41110?

Sincerely

Lanto

PS

I have 1 M620 , 1M630 , 2FC630 in FX2 Chassis for Esxi vmware

and 2 * M620 with RH6 for the physical server

lrasoanaivo · Answer

Hello ,

There is no reason that don't want to replicate the physical server volumes.

I just want to have the solution which is easy ,fast and sure.

In your idea and with your experience , which is the best solution ?:

1- keep the new group and replicate the physical server volumes:

Do you have DELL documentation of replication best practice ?

2- Break the new group and join the tPS6210 to the first group(thanks for your previous explication) For the moment ; I have only 5 virtual machines migrated in the new group .

Thanks

Sincerely

Lanto

Origin3k · Answer

After 9.5 years with 24 EQL in the house i would bring the 6210 back into the group with the existing M4110. With all members in one group you can move the volume around with no downtime by just clicking a button within GroupManager.

- Place the 6210 on its own pool to verify if its working well and wait until the raid buid is finished. I also highly suggest to perform a CM restart to see if the standby CM get switch connectifiy and if the hosts can ping the interfaces

- Bring them all to the same FW

Now you have 3 option and IIRC i tried all of them but cant remember to the last one

1. Move Volume between Pool
- It took ages
- Only on volume on time

2. Move the 6210 into the M4110 pool
- EQLs volume distribution kicks in and place data on the new guy
- At the end select delete M4110 member to evacuate the rest of the volume
- Works fine if you have a lot of volumes

3. Merge Pools
- Cant remember in details

All 3 variants works very well and without downtime or doesnt effecting the Hosts. Most of the time with use method 2.

Note: With VMware 6.5 they come with VMFS 6.0. You cant upgrade existing Datastores and have to create a new Datastore and selecting the VMFS 6.0 option. After that you have to svMotion your VMs.

Regards,
Joerg

EqualLogic

How to migrate volumes between 2 groups of equalogic

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