Dell PowerVault MD3260i - Manual (Page 81)

Preparing Host Servers To Recopy A Virtual Disk
CAUTION: Before you create a new copy of a source virtual disk, stop any data access (I/O) activity or suspend
data transfer to the source virtual disk (and, if applicable, the target disk) to ensure that you capture an accurate
point-in-time image of the source virtual disk. Close all applications, including Windows Internet Explorer, to make
sure all I/O activity has stopped.
NOTE: Removing the drive letter of the associated virtual disk(s) in Windows or unmounting the virtual drive in
Linux helps to guarantee a stable copy of the drive for the virtual disk copy.
Before creating a new virtual disk copy for an existing copy pair, both the server and the associated virtual disk you are
recopying have to be in the proper state. To ensure that the host server is properly prepared to create a virtual disk
recopy, you can either use an application to carry out this task, or you can perform the following steps:
1. Stop all I/O activity to the source and target virtual disk.
2. Using your Windows system, flush the cache to both the source and the target virtual disk (if mounted). At the host
prompt, type SMrepassist -f and press .
See "SMrepassist Utility" in the
Owner’s Manual for more information.
3. Remove the drive letter(s) of the source and (if mounted) virtual disk in Windows or unmount the virtual drive(s) in
Linux to help guarantee a stable copy of the drive for the virtual disk. If this is not done, the copy operation reports
that it has completed successfully, but the copied data is not updated properly.
4. Follow any additional instructions for your operating system. Failure to follow these additional instructions can
create unusable virtual disk copies.
NOTE: If your operating system requires additional instructions, you can find those instructions in your
operating system documentation.
After your server has been prepared, see Recopying The Virtual Disk to recopy the virtual disk.
Recopying The Virtual Disk
After first preparing the host server(s) as specified in the preceding procedure, use the following examples to make a
virtual disk copy.
The following syntax is the general form of the command:
recopy virtualDiskCopy target [targetName] [source
[sourceName] copyPriority=(highest | high | medium
| low | lowest) targetReadOnlyEnabled=(TRUE | FALSE)]
NOTE: Use one or all of the optional parameters as needed to help define your configuration. It is not necessary to
use any optional parameters.
Refer to steps 1 through 4 in the preceding section, Preparing Host Servers To Recopy A Virtual Disk. The following
example shows a command that changes the copy priority:
client>smcli 123.45.67.89 -c "recopy
virtualDiskCopy target [\"Obi_1\"] copyPriority=highest;"
The command in this example copies data from the source virtual disk associated with the target virtual disk Obi_1 to the
target virtual disk again. The copy priority is set to the highest value to complete the virtual disk copy as quickly as
possible. The underlying consideration for using this command is that you have already created the virtual disk copy
pair. When you create a virtual disk copy pair, you automatically created one virtual disk copy. Using this command, you
are copying the data from the source virtual disk to the target virtual disk. You are making this copy because the data on
the source virtual disk changed since the previous copy was made.
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