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12 using volumes, Volumes and server access, Prerequisites – HP LeftHand P4000 Virtual SAN Appliance Software User Manual

Page 155: Planning volumes, Planning how many volumes, Planning volume types, Guide for volumes, Planning how many volumes planning volume types

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12 Using volumes

A volume is a logical entity that is made up of storage on one or more storage systems. It can be
used as raw data storage or it can be formatted with a file system and used by a host or file server.
Create volumes on clusters that contain one or more storage systems.

Before creating volumes, plan your strategies for using the volume: how you plan to use it, its size,
how servers will access it, and how you will manage backups of the data, whether through Remote
Copy or third-party applications, or both.

Volumes and server access

After you create a volume, assign it to one or more servers to provide access to volumes by
application servers. For detailed information, see

“Controlling server access to volumes” (page 197)

.

Prerequisites

Before you create a volume, you must have created a management group and at least one cluster.
For more information, see the following:

“Working with management groups” (page 104)

“Creating a cluster” (page 133)

Planning volumes

Planning volumes takes into account multiple factors.

The number of volumes you need

The type of volumes you are creating - primary or remote

The size for each volume

Whether you plan to use snapshots

The level of data protection required

Whether you plan to grow the volume, or leave it the same size

NOTE:

If you plan to mount file systems, create a volume for each file system you plan to mount.

Then grow each file system independently.

Planning how many volumes

For information about the recommended maximum number of volumes and snapshots that can be
created in a management group, see

“Configuration Summary overview” (page 109)

.

Planning volume types

Primary volumes are volumes used for data storage.

Remote volumes are used as targets for Remote Copy for business continuance, backup and
recovery, and data mining/migration configurations. See the Remote Copy User Guide for
detailed information about remote volumes.

A SmartClone volume is a type of volume that is created from an existing volume or snapshot.
SmartClone volumes are described in

“SmartClone volumes” (page 178)

.

Guide for volumes

When creating a volume, you define the following characteristics.

Volumes and server access

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