Symmetrix Foundations Student Resource Guide

Symmetrix Foundations, 1
Symmetrix Foundations
EMC Global Education

2004 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. These materials may not be copied without EMC's written consent. 1
Welcome to Symmetrix Foundations. EMC offers a full range of storage platforms, from the CLARiiON CX200 at the low end to the unsurpassed DMX3000 at the high end. This training provides an architectural introduction to the Symmetrix family of products. The focus will be on DMX, but prior generations of Symmetrix will also be discussed. Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. These materials may not be copied without EMC's written consent. EMC believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its publication date. The information is subject to change without notice. THE INFORMATION IN THIS PUBLICATION IS PROVIDED AS IS. EMC CORPORATION MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND WITH RESPECT TO THE INFORMATION IN THIS PUBLICATION, AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIMS IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Use, copying, and distribution of any EMC software described in this publication requires an applicable software license.
Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
Audio Portion of this Course

z The AUDIO portion of this course is supplemental to the
material and is not a replacement for the student notes accompanying this course. Guide (from the Supporting Materials tab) and reading the notes in their entirety.
z EMC recommends downloading the Student Resource

2004 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved. 2
The AUDIO portion of this course is supplemental to the material and is not a replacement for the student notes accompanying this course. EMC recommends downloading the Student Resource Guide from the Supporting Materials tab, and reading the notes in their entirety.
EMC Technology Foundations

z EMC Technology Foundations (ETF) is a curriculum that presents
overviews of EMC products and technologies including:
Symmetrix and CLARiiON Storage Platforms and Software SAN, NAS and CAS Networked Storage Solutions Advanced storage management software
z The EMC Technology portfolio consists of end-to-end services and
platforms designed to accelerate the implementation of Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) cost-effectively, manage and protect their data, and achieve regulatory compliance. It improves the availability of their business information in a way that connects its use to business goals and service levels
z ILM uses EMC technologies to enable organizations to better, and more
z This course represents one part of the ETF curriculum

Companies across all industries are constantly launching new business-critical applications turning information into strategic corporate assets. Value to the bottom line for customers, suppliers, and partners is often directly related to how easily this information can be shared across the enterprise and beyond. Information Lifecycle Management (ILM) is a flexible information-centric strategy that includes automating the process of connecting applications and servers in an organization to its companys information. ILM includes Direct Attached Storage (DAS), Storage Area Network (SAN), Network Attached Storage (NAS), Content Addressed Storage (CAS), and software for management and automated provisioning. ILM facilitates the integration of SAN and NAS, extends the reach of enterprise storage, and delivers a common way to manage, share, and protect information. It also takes advantage of todays network and channel technologies to consolidate servers and storage, centralize backup, and manage the explosive growth of data.
Symmetrix Foundations
After completing this course, you will be able to:
z Describe the basic architecture of a Symmetrix
Integrated Cached Disk Array (ICDA)
z Identify the front-end, back-end, cache, and physical
drive configurations of various Symmetrix models requests from the host environment
z Explain how Symmetrix functionally handles I/O z Illustrate the relationship between Symmetrix physical
disk drives and Symmetrix Logical Volumes Symmetrix
z Identify the media protection options available on the

These are the learning objectives for this training. Please take a moment to read them.
Symmetrix Integrated Cached Disk Array

z Highest level of performance
and availability in the industry z Consolidation

Capacities to Terabytes Vast host connectivity SAN or NAS
z Advanced functionality
Parallel processing architecture Intelligent prefetch Auto cache destage Dynamic mirror service policy Multi-region internal memory Predictive failure analysis and call home Back-end optimization
2004 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.
z Enginuity Operating
Environment
Base services for data integrity, optimization, security, and Quality of Service Core services for data mobility, sharing, repurposing, and recovery
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There are basically three categories of storage architectures: Cache Centric, Storage Processor centric, and JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Disks). The Symmetrix falls under the category of cache centric storage and is an Integrated Caching Disk Array.
Enginuity Operating Environment

z
Symmetrix Based Applications Host Based Management Software ISV Software

z
Enginuity Operating Environment is the Symmetrix software that: Manages all operations Ensures data integrity Optimizes performance Enginuity is often referred to as the microcode Solutions Enabler provides common API and CLI interface for managing Symmetrix and the entire storage infrastructure EMC and ISV develop management software supporting heterogeneous platforms using Solutions Enabler API and CLIs
6
Solutions Enabler Management Enginuity Operating Environment Symmetrix Hardware

Before we get into the hardware, lets briefly introduce the software components, as most functionality is based in software and supported by the hardware. Enginuity is the operating environment for the Symmetrix storage systems. Enginuity manages all Symmetrix operations, from monitoring and optimizing internal data flow, to ensuring the fastest response to the users requests for information, to protecting and replicating data. Enginuity is often referred to as the Microcode. Solutions Enabler is storage management that provides a common access mechanism for managing multivendor environments, including the Symmetrix, storage, switches, and host storage resources. It enables the creation of powerful storage management applications that dont have to understand the management details of each piece within an EMC users environment. Solutions Enabler is a development initiative (that is, a program available to Integrated Software Vendors (ISVs) and developers through the EMC Developers Program) and provides a set of storage application programming interfaces (APIs) that shield the management applications from the details beneath. It provides a common set of interfaces to manage all aspects of storage. With Solutions Enabler providing building blocks for integrating layered software applications, ISVs and third-party software developers (through the EMC Developers Program), and EMC software developers are given wide-scale access to Enginuity functionality.
Symmetrix Card Cage
DMX800 Model
DMX1000 Maximum Front End Directors
DMX2000 Maximum Cache Directors
DMX3000 Maximum Cache Maximum Disk Drives
Maximum Back End Directors
DMX800 DMX1000 DMX1000P DMX2000 DMX2000P DMX 3000 8830 8530 8230
2 6 4 12 8 8 8 4 2
2 2 4 4 8 8 8 4 2
2 4 4 8 8 8 4 4 2
64GB 128GB 128GB 256GB 256GB 256GB 64GB 64GB 32GB
120 144 144 288 288 576 384 96 48

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Though we logically divide the architecture of the Symmetrix into Front End, Back End, and Shared Global Memory, physically, these director and memory cards reside side-by-side within the card cage of the Symmetrix. The DMX P model is configured for maximum performance rather than connectivity.
DMX2000

Symmetrix Architecture is based on the concept of N + 1 redundancy (one more component than is necessary for operation). Continuous Operation even if failures occur to any major component:

Global Memory Director boards Channel Director boards Disk Director boards Disk drives Communications Control Card
Environmental Control Card Cooling Fan Modules Power modules Batteries Service Processor
Power Subsystem: The Symmetrix has a modular power subsystem featuring a redundant architecture that facilitates field replacement without interruption. The Symmetrix power subsystem connects to two dedicated or isolated AC power lines. If AC power fails on one AC line, the power subsystem automatically switches to the other AC line. System Battery Backup: The Symmetrix backup battery subsystem maintains power to the entire system if AC power is lost. The backup battery subsystem allows Symmetrix to remain online to the host system for one to three minutes (set in IMPL.bin file) in the event of an AC power loss, allowing the directors to flush cache write data to the disk devices. Symmetrix continually recharges the battery subsystem whenever it is under AC power. When a power failure occurs, power switches immediately to the backup battery, and Symmetrix continues to operate normally. When the battery timer window elapses, Symmetrix presents a busy status to prevent the attached hosts from initiating any new I/O. The Symmetrix destages any write data still in cache to disk, spins down the disk devices, and retracts the heads and powers down. Symmetrix Emergency Power Off: The Symmetrix emergency power off sequence allows 20 seconds to destage pending write data. When the EPO switch is set to off, Symmetrix immediately switches to battery backup, and initiates writes of cache data. Data is written to the first available spare area on any devices available for write. The director records that there are pending write operations to complete, and stores the location of all data that has been temporarily redirected. When power is restored, all data is written to its proper volumes.
Cache Management
Data path through Symmetrix
Data destaged from cache

There are three functional areas:

Global Memory - provides cache memory and link between independent front end and back end Channel director - how the Symmetrix connects to the host (server) environment (multi-processor circuit boards) Disk director- how the Symmetrix controls and manages its physical disk drives, referred to as Disk Directors or Disk Adapters
Channel directors handle I/O request from the host, while disk directors manage access to disk drives. The channel directors and disk directors share global memory. Cache is used for staging and destaging data between the host and the disk drives. Data is stored in cache as write pending, and an acknowledgement of data receipt is returned to the host. The disk directors will write the data from cache to disk at a later time. The cache directory contains information on data location, which data is still in cache, and which data has been written to disk.
Direct Matrix Architecture

What differentiates the Symmetrix generations and models is the number, type, and speed of the various processors, and the technology used to interconnect the front-end and back-end with cache. The DMX Series system currently uses M5 memory boards. Each memory board has sixteen ports, one to each director. Each region can sustain a data rate of 500MBs, 4 regions per card, so 2GB per card. If a director is removed from a system, the usable bandwidth is not reduced. If a memory board is removed, the usable bandwidth is dropped by 2GB/s. In addition to 8 ports to front end hosts, or backend disks (depending on board type), each director also has 8 ports to memory, one to each of the memory boards. All four processors can connect concurrently to four different memory boards. In a fully configured Symmetrix DMX2000/3000 system, each of the eight director ports on the sixteen directors connects to one of the sixteen memory ports on each of the eight global memory directors. These 128 individual point-to-point connections facilitate up to 128 concurrent global memory operations in the system.
Symmetrix DMX Architecture

Servers
Separate Control and Communications Message Matrix
Disks
Another major performance improvement with the DMX is the separate control and communications matrix that enables communication between the directors, without consuming cache bandwidth. This becomes more apparent as we talk about read and write operations and the information flow through the Symmetrix later in this training.
DMX Director Pairing

Directors are paired Processor to Processor using the 17 rule. This means mirrors will not be placed across Directors using the 17 rule (unless only 2 Directors are present). Paired directors provide redundant paths to dual ported disks, and will not use the same Port Bypass Card (PBC) in order to maintain redundancy on the Port Bypass Card level. The PBC acts as the hub for all the Fibre disk drives in the disk cage.
DMX: Dual-ported Disk and Redundant Directors

z
Directors are always configured in pairs to facilitate secondary paths to drives Each disk module has two fully independent Fibre Channel ports Drive port connects to the Director by a separate loop
Each port connects to different Directors in the Director pair Port bypass cards prevent a Director failure or replacement from affecting the other drives on the loop
Disk Director 1
Disk Director 16 S
z z
P S P S P S P
P S P S P S P
Directors have four primary loops for normal drive communication and four secondary loops to provide alternate path if the other director fails (based on performance models)
S P = Primary Connection to Drive S= Secondary Connection for Redundancy

13

Symmetrix DMX back-end employs an arbitrated loop design and dual-ported disk drives. Here is an example of a 9 disk per loop configuration. Each drive connects to two Disk Directors through separate Fibre Channel loops. The loops are configured in a star-hub topology with gated hub ports and bypass switches, that allow individual Fibre Channel disk drives to be dynamically inserted or removed.
Back-end Director Pairing 9-drive loop

Director 1d PBC
A A B B A A B B A A
16d C0 1d C1 16d C2 1d C3 16d C4 1d C5 16d C6 1d C7 16d C8
d c b a
A B A B A B A B
Director 16d
A B A B A B A B
d c b a
PBC
Legend
Primary Connection Director 1d Bypass Connection Director 1d Primary Connection Director 16d Bypass Connection Director 16d
B B A A B B
14
The Port Bypass Card contains the switch elements and control functions to allow intelligent management of the two FC-AL loops embedded in each disk cage midplane. There are two Port Bypass Cards per disk cage midplane. Each disk cage midplane can support 36 FC drives. Each Processor has two ports, each with devices in the Front, as well as in the Back, Disk Midplane. In the above slide, we are showing only one port from Director 1d, and one port from Director 16d. Notice that each Director has the potential to access all Drives in the loop (9-drive loop configuration in this example). Notice also that using the Port Bypass Card, each director is currently accessing only a portion of the drives (Director 1d has 4 Drives; Director 16d has 5 Drives). These Directors will have an opposite configuration on their second port, which is connected to a different Port Bypass Card and Disk Midplane. For example, Director 1d has 4 Drives in this Disk Midplane, and on its other port it will have 5. Director 16d has 5 Drives in this Disk Midplane, and on its other port it will have 4. Director 1d and Director 16d will be paired in both the front and back Disk Midplanes (only one shown here). With no component failure, each processor will manage 4 drives on one port and 5 Drives on the other. These reside in Front and Back Disk Midplanes and are referred to as C and D Devices. If the processor on Director 1d fails, the processor on Director 16d will now access all 9 Drives on this loop.
DMX800 Architectural Overview
SPE Enclosure

The physical layout of the DMX800 is very different than previous Symmetrix models. Directors, Memory, back adapter functionality, communications and environmental functions are all in the Storage Processor Enclosure (SPE). The DMX800 looks similar to the CLARiiON CX600 series and does in fact use the same back end style components. The SPE Contains 2 - 4 Fibre director boards, up to 2 Multi Protocol Boards, 2 Memory boards, 2 Front-end Backend (FEBE) adapters, Redundant Power Supplies and Fan module. The DMX800 does not contain disk drive cages; drives are in a separate Disk Array Enclosure (DAE). Each DAE has 2 Link Controller Cards (LCCs) and 2 Power Supplies. The Service Processor is replaced by a 1U (1U = 1.75) Server, the Server will support 4 SPEs via 4 of its 6 Ethernet connections. Batteries, or Standby Power Supplies (SPS), are in a separate 1U enclosure. Each SPS enclosure contains two SPSes, and supports either two DAEs or one SPE. There are no ECM or CCM boards in the DMX800. The Communication and Environmental functions are taken care of by Directors and FEBE Adapters.
Symmetrix 5.X LVD Architecture

Front End
Channel Director Top High
3 Bay Cabinet
8830 8530 8230
Shared Global Memory
Top Low
Back End
Disk Director
1 Bay Cabinet Bay Cabinet
Processor b
PowerPC 750 333Mhz
Processor b
PowerPC 750 333Mhz
400 MBS Internal Bus
Cache
400 MBS Internal Bus
Processor a
PowerPC 750 333 Mhz
Processor a
PowerPC 750 333 Mhz
High Memory Low Memory
80 MBS SCSI LVD Bus Bottom High
Bottom Low

Here is another example of the MOSAIC 2000 Architecture. This is the basic architecture for Symmetrix 5.X LVD:

Bus speed of 400MB/s for an aggregate of 1600 MB/s Back End Directors and Drives support Ultra 2 SCSI LVD (Low Voltage Differential) and the bus speed of 80 MB/s The director processors are now 333 Mhz; ESCON directors are 400 Mhz Each director connects to 2 internal system buses (Top High & Bottom Low for odd directors | Bottom High & Top Low for even directors ) M4 Generation of Memory Boards support LVD ( Low Voltage Differential or Ultra 2 SCSI Enginuity 5567 or greater)
The Symmetrix 5 (8730, 8430) follows the same bus structure but has speeds of 360MB/s for an aggregate of 1440 MB/s. The Symmetrix 4.X family is based on a dual system bus design. Each director is connected to either the X bus (odd numbered director) or Y bus (even numbered director). Each director card has two sides, the b processor (top half) and the a processor (bottom half). Data is transferred throughout the Symmetrix (from Channel Director to Memory to Disk Director) in a serial fashion along the system buses. For every 64 bits of data, the Symmetrix creates a 72 bit Memory Word (64 bits of data + 8 bits of parity). These Memory Words are then sent in a serial fashion across the internal buses to director from cache or to cache from director.
Symm 5: Dual-Initiator Disk Director

z Disk Directors are installed in
pairs to facilitate secondary paths to drives z In the unlikely event of a disk director processor failure, the adjacent director will continue servicing the attached drives through secondary path
In this example, DA1 processor b would see ports C & D for DA2 processor b as its A & B ports in a fail-over scenario
z Protecting against DA
DA 1
Processor b
MIDPLANE
Port C
Port D
DA 2
Port C
processor card failure
Processor b
Port D
z Physical drives are not dual-
ported but are connected via a dual-initiator SCSI Bus z Volumes are typically mirrored across directors
MIDPLANE

Solid line = Primary Path Dotted line = Secondary Path
17
Symmetrix 4 and 5 architectures utilize a dual-initiator back-end architecture that ensures continuous availability of data in the unlikely event of a Disk Director failure. This feature works by having two disk directors shadow the function of each other. That is, each disk director has the capability of servicing any or all of the disk devices of the disk director it is paired with. Under normal conditions, each disk director only services its disk devices. If Symmetrix detects a disk director hardware failure, Symmetrix calls home but continues to read from or write to the disk devices through the disk director it is paired with. When the source of the failure is corrected, Symmetrix returns the I/O servicing of the two disk directors to their normal state. Prior to the Symmetrix DMX, mirrored volumes were configured with what is known as the rule of 17. Because of where within the card cage the DA pairs reside (1/2, 3/4, 13/14, 15/16), as long as the sum of the DA director numbers equals 17 (1/16, 2/15, 3/14, 4/13), the mirrors will always be on different internal system buses and dual initiators for the highest availability and maximum Symmetrix resources. Note: On the 4.x family, dual-initiation occurs by physically connecting one disk directors port card to the port card of the adjacent disk director with a dual slotted adapter card.
Symmetrix Back End

Disk Director
Processor b
Port C Port D
z Symmetrix 4 and 5
Port C Port D
Processor a
architectures use 40/80MB/s SCSI to connect physical drives with a maximum of 12 drives per port adjacent slots within the card cage of Symmetrix Fibre Channel drives
z DAs installed in pairs on
d c b a
A B A B A B A B
A A B B A A B B
z DMX Architecture uses 2Gb
Eight ports per Director Maximum 18 dual ported drives per port
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The primary purpose of the Back End director is to read and write data to the physical disks. However, when it is not staging data in cache or destaging data to disk, the disk director is responsible for proactive monitoring of physical drives and cache memory. This is referred to as disk and cache scrubbing. Disk Scrubbing or Disk Error Correction and Error Verification: The disk directors use idle time to read data and check the polynomial correction bits for validity. If a disk read error occurs, the disk director reads all data on that track to Symmetrix cache memory. The disk director writes several worst case patterns to that track searching for media errors. When the test completes, the disk director rewrites the data from cache to the disk device, verifying the write operation. The disk microprocessor maps around any bad block (or blocks) detected during the worst case write operation, thus skipping defects in the media. When the internal soft error threshold is reached, the Symmetrix service processor automatically dials the EMC Customer Support Center and notifies the host system of errors via sense data. Cache Scrubbing or Cache Error Correction and Error Verification: The disk directors use idle time to periodically read cache, correct errors, and write the corrected data back to cache. This process is called error verification or scrubbing. When the directors detect an uncorrectable error in cache, Symmetrix reads the data from disk and takes the defective cache memory block offline until an EMC Customer Engineer can repair it. Error verification maximizes data availability by significantly reducing the probability of encountering an uncorrectable error by preventing bit errors from accumulating in cache.
Symmetrix Global Cache Directors

z Memory boards are now referred
to as Global Cache Directors and contain global shared memory chips and divided into four addressable regions
z Boards are comprised of memory
z Symmetrix has a minimum of 2
memory boards and a maximum of 8. Generally installed in pairs available in 2 GB, 4 GB, 8 GB, 16 GB and 32 GB sizes
z Individual cache directors are
z Memory boards are FRUs and
hot swappable (does not require Symmetrix power down or reboot) EMC Global Education
Cache boards are designed for each family of Symmetrix. Symmetrix 4.8 uses the M2 generation of memory boards that connect to both the X and Y internal buses. Symmetrix 5 uses the M3/M4 generation of memory boards and the DMX uses M5. Because these boards have different designs, they cannot be swapped between families of Symmetrix. On Symmetrix 5, memory boards that connect to the Top High and Bottom High internal system buses are referred to as High Memory. Conversely, boards that connect to Top Low and Bottom Low are known as Low Memory. DMX uses direct connections between directors and cache. When configuring cache for the Symmetrix DMX systems, follow these guidelines:
A minimum of four and a maximum of eight cache director boards is required for the DMX2000 and DMX3000 system configuration; and a minimum of two and a maximum of four cache director boards is required for the DMX1000 system configuration. Two-board cache director configurations require boards of equal size. Cache directors can be added one at a time to configurations of two boards and greater. A maximum of two different cache director sizes is supported, and the smallest cache director must be at least one-half the size of the largest cache director. In cache director configurations with more than two boards, no more than one half of the boards can be smaller than the largest cache director.
Cache Age Link Chain

z Locality of Reference
If a data block has been recently used, adjacent data will be needed soon Prefetch algorithm detects sequential data access patterns
z Data Re-use
Accessed Data will probably be used again

z Least Recently Used
Flush old data from cache and only keep active data in cache Free up cache slots that are inactive to make room for more active data

Cache is allocated in tracks referred to as cache slots, which are 32Kbytes in size (57 Kbytes for Mainframe). If the Symmetrix is supporting both FBA and CKD emulation within the same frame, the cache slots will equal the largest track size, 57K (3390). The Track Table is a directory of the data residing in cache and of the location/condition of the data residing on Symmetrix physical disk(s). Track Tables are used to keep the status of each track, and of each logical volume. Approximately 16 Bytes of cache space is used for each track. Prefetching is done by the Disk Director. Once sequential access is detected, prefetch is automatically turned on for that logical volume. Prefetch is initiated by 2 sequential accesses to a volume. Once turned on, for every sequential access, the Symmetrix will pull the next two successive tracks into cache (access to track 1 on cylinder 1 and will prompt the prefetch of tracks 2 & 3 on cylinder 1). After 100 sequential accesses to that volume, the next sequential access will initiate the prefetching of the next 5 tracks on that volume (access to track 1 on cylinder 10 will prompt the prefetch of tracks 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6 on cylinder 10). After the next 100 sequential accesses to that volume, the prefetch track value is increased to 8 (access to track 1 on cylinder 100 will prompt the prefetch of tracks 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 & 9 on cylinder 100). Any non-sequential accesses to that volume will turn the prefetch capability off. As data is placed into cache or accessed within cache, it is given a pseudo timestamp. This allows the Symmetrix to maintain only the most frequently accessed data in cache memory. The data residing in cache is ordered through an Age-Link-Chain. As data is touched (read operation for example), it moves to the top of the Age-Link-Chain. Every time a director performs a cache operation, it must take control of the LRU algorithm. This forces the director to mark the least recently used data in cache to be overwritten by the next cache operation.
Read Operations

Read Hit In a read hit operation, the requested data resides in global memory. The channel director transfers the requested data through the channel interface to the host, and updates the global memory director. Since the data is in global memory, there are no mechanical delays due to seek, latency, and rotational position sensing that is encountered with disk. Read Miss In a read miss operation, the requested data is not in global memory, and must be retrieved from a disk device. The disk director stores the data in global memory and updates the directory table. The Channel director then reconnects with the host and transfers the data. The host sends an acknowledgement and the directory tables are updated.
Write Operations

Fast Write On a write command, the channel director places the incoming blocks directly into global memory. The channel director sends an acknowledgement to the host. The directory tables are updated, and the disk director will asynchronously destage the data from global memory to the disk device. Delayed fast Write A delayed fast write occurs only when the fast write threshold has been exceeded. That is, the percentage of global memory containing modified data is higher than the fast write threshold. If this situation occurs, the Symmetrix system disconnects the channel director(s) from the channel. The disk directors then destage the Least Recently Used data to disk. When sufficient global memory space is available, the channel directors reconnect to their channels, and process the host I/O request as a fast write. The Symmetrix system continues to process read operations during delayed fast writes. With sufficient global memory present, this type of global memory operation rarely occurs.
Cache Allocation
z Cache algorithms are designed to optimize cache utilization and
fairness for all Symmetrix Volumes
z Cache allocation dynamically adjust based on current usage
Symmetrix constantly monitors system utilization (including individual volume activity) More active volumes are dynamically allocated additional cache resources from relatively less active volumes Each volume has a minimum and maximum number of cache slots for write operations

When a Symmetrix is IMPLed (Initial Microcode Program Load), the amount of available cache resources is automatically distributed to all of the logical volumes in the configuration. For example, if a Symmetrix were configured with 100 logical volumes of the same size and emulation, then at IMPL, each one would receive 1% of available cache resources. As soon as reads and writes to volumes begins, the Symmetrix Operating Environment (Enginuity) dynamically adjusts the allocation of cache. If only 1 of the 100 volumes was active, it would get incrementally more cache and the remaining amount would be redistributed to the other 99 volumes. Managing each individual volumes write activity enables Enginuity to typically prevent system-wide delayed write situations.
Enginuity Overview
z Operating Environment for Symmetrix Each processor in each director is loaded with Enginuity
Downloaded from service processor to directors over internal LAN Zipped code loaded from EEPROM to SDRAM (control store of director)
Enginuity is what allows the independent director processors to act as one Integrated Cached Disk Array
Also provides the framework for advanced functionality like SRDF, TimeFinder,...etc.
All DMX ship with the latest Enginuity
5670.73.69
Symmetrix Hardware Supported: 50 = Symm3 52 = Symm4 55 = Symm5 56 = DMX

Microcode Family (Major Release Level)
Field Release Level of Symmetrix Microcode (Minor Release Level)
Field Release Level of Service Processor Code (Minor Release Level)
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Non-disruptive microcode upgrade and load capabilities are currently available for the Symmetrix. Symmetrix takes advantage of a multi-processing and redundant architecture to allow for hot loadability of similar microcode platforms. The new microcode loads into the EEPROM areas within the channel and disk directors, and remains idle until requested for hot load in control storage. The Symmetrix system does not require manual intervention on the customers part to perform this function. All channel and disk directors remain in an on-line state to the host processor, thus maintaining application access. Symmetrix will load executable code at selected windows of opportunity within each director hardware resource, until all directors have been loaded. Once the executable code is loaded, internal processing is synchronized and the new code becomes operational.
5670+ Management Features Enhancements

z 5670+ Management Features End User Configuration
User control of volumes and type
Symm Purge
Secure deletion method
Logical Volumes
Increased number of hypers
Volume Expansion
Striped meta expansion

User Configuration - Enginuity v 5670+ will allow users to un-map CKD volumes, delete CKD volumes, or convert CKD volumes to FBA. These user configuration controls will simplify the task of reusing a Symmetrix by not requiring an EMC resource to modify the bin file. Symm Purge - provides customers a secure method of deleting (electronic shredding) sensitive data. This will simplify the reuse of drive assets. Logical Volumes - v 5670+ will support an increased number of hypers per spindle. The number of hypers will depend on the protection scheme. Volume Expansion - Previous microcode versions only supported the expansion of concatenated meta volumes. V5670+ will now support the expansion of both striped and concatenated meta volumes.
5670+ Business Continuity Features

z 5670+ Business Continuity Features SRDF/A
multi-session support
Protected Restore
Enhanced restore features
SNAP Persistence
Preserves snap session

SRDF/A- currently (v 5670) SRDF-A can only support a single-session. With v5670+ code, support will be available for multi-session SRDF/A data replication. Multi-session uses host control (Mainframe only). Cycle switching is synchronized between the single-session SRDF/A Symmetrix pairs. Protected Restore- v 5670+ provides Protected Restore features. While the restore is in progress, read miss data will come from the BCV, writes to the Standard volume will not propagate to the BCV, and the original Standard to BCV relationship will be maintained. SNAP Persistence - v 5670+allows a protected snap restore and preserves the virtual snap session when the restore terminates.
Configuration Considerations
z
Understand the applications on the host connected to the Symmetrix system

Capacity requirements I/O rates Read/Write ratios Read/Write - Sequential or Random
Understand special host considerations

Maximum drive and file system sizes supported Consider Logical Volume Manager (LVM) on the host and the use of data striping Device sharing requirements - Clustering
Determine Volume size and appropriate level of protection

Symmetrix provides flexibility for different sizes and protection within a system Standard sizes make it easier to manage
z z
Determine connectivity requirements

Number of channels available from each host
Distribute workloads from the busiest to the least busy

The best possible performance will only be achieved if all the resources within the system are being equally utilized. This is much easier said than done, but through careful planning, you will have a better chance for success. Planning starts with understanding the host and application requirements. Within the Symmetrix bin-file, the emulation type, size in cylinders, count, number of mirrors, and special flags (like BCV, DRV, Dynamic Spare) are defined. Each Symmetrix Logical Volume is assigned a hexadecimal identifier. The bin file also tells the Channel director which volumes are presented on which port, and the address used to access it. From the Hosts perspective, when a device discovery process occurs, the information provided back to the OS appears to be referencing a series of SCSI disk drives. To an Open Systems host, the Symmetrix looks like a JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Disks). The host is unaware of the bin file, RAID protection, remote mirroring, BCV mirrors, dynamic sparing, ...etc. In other words, the host thinks its getting an entire physical drive.
Symmetrix Configuration Information

z
Symmetrix configuration information includes the following:

Physical hardware that is installed number and type of directors, memory, and physical drives Mapping of physical disks to logical volumes Mapping of addresses to volumes and to front-end directors Operational parameters for front-end directors
Bin file stored in two places
z z
Configuration information is referred to as the IMPL.bin file or simply the bin file Stored in two places:
On the Hard Disk of the Symmetrix Service Processor In the EEPROM of each Symmetrix Director
Configuration changes can also be made using EMC ControlCenter Configuration Manager GUI and Solutions Enabler CLI
Directors
Service Processor

Two very important concepts: Each director (both Channel and Disk) has a local copy (stored in EPROM) of the configuration file. This enables Channel Directors to be aware of the Disk Directors that are managing the physical copy(ies) of Symmetrix Logical Volumes and vice versa. The bin file also allows Channel Directors to map host requests to a channel address, or target and LUN to the Symmetrix Logical Volume. Changes made to the bin file (non-SDR changes) must first be made to the IMPL.BIN on the Service Processor and then downloaded to the directors over the internal Ethernet LAN. Though Customer Service has the capability to do remote bin file updates (using the EMC Remote application), standard operating procedure mandates the CE be physically present for all configuration changes. In addition, CS requires that all CEs do a comparison analysis prior to committing changes (the existing IMPL.BIN is compared to the proposed IMPL.BIN).
Disk Performance Basics

z Three components of disk performance
Rotational Delay
Time to reposition actuator - Seek time Rotational latency Transfer rate

z With a Symmetrix, I/Os are serviced
from cache not from the physical HDA

Minimizes the inherent latencies of physical disk I/O Disk I/O at memory speeds
Position Actuator
Transfer Data
Disk I/O =
Seek time
+ Rotational Delay + Transfer Rate time

When you look at a physical disk drive, a read or write operation has three components that add up to the overall response time. Actuator positioning is the time it takes to move the read/write heads over the desired cylinder. This is mechanical movement and is typically measured in milliseconds. The actual time that it takes to reposition depends on how far the heads have to move, but this contributes to the greatest share of the overall response time. Rotational Delay is the time it takes for the desired information to come under the ready write head. This time is the function of the revolutions per second, or drive RPM. The faster the drive turns, the lower the rotational latency. A 10,000 RPM drive has an average rotational latency of approximately 3.00 milliseconds, which is half the time it takes to make one revolution. Transfer Rate is the smallest time component and consists of the time it takes to actually read/write the data. This is a function of drive RPM and the data density. It is often measured as internal transfer rate or external transfer rate. The external rate is the speed that the drive transfers data to the controller. This is limited by the internal transfer rate, but with buffers on the drive modules themselves, it allows faster transfer rates. The design objective of a Symmetrix is to not limit the performance of host applications based on the performance limitations of the physical disk. This is accomplished using cache. Write operations are to cache and asynchronously destage to disk. Read operations are from cache using the Least Recently Used algorithm and prefetching to keep the information that is most likely to be accessed in memory.
Symmetrix Disk Comparisons
36 GB
18 GB
36 GB
73 GB
146 GB
181 GB
73 GB
73 GB
146 GB
Spindle Speed
7,200
10,000
10,000
10,000
10,000
10,000
10,000
15,000
10,000
Symmetrix Sym 4.8 Architecture
Sym 5.X
Sym 5.X
Sym 5.X
Sym 5.X
Sym 5.X
DMX
DMX
DMX
Interface
Ultra SCSI Ultra SCSI Ultra SCSI Ultra SCSI Ultra SCSI Ultra SCSI
Fibre Channel
Fibre Channel
Fibre Channel

Symmetrix physical drives are manufactured by our supplier (Seagate, Hitachi) to meet EMCs rigorous quality standards and unique product specifications. These specification include, dedicated microprocessors (that can be XOR capable), the most functionally robust microcode available, and large onboard buffer memory (4MB 32MB). Again, while the physical speed of disk drives does contribute to the overall performance, the Symmetrix design is for most read or write operations to be handled from cache.
Mapping Physical Volumes to Logical Volumes

z Symmetrix Physical Drives are split into Hyper Volume Extensions
Physical Drive Logical Volume Logical Volume Logical Volume Logical Volume
4.2 GB 4.2 GB 4.2 GB 4.2 GB
18 GB
z Hyper Volume Extensions (disk slices) are then defined as Symmetrix
Logical Volumes
Symmetrix Logical Volumes are internally labeled with hexadecimal identifier (0000-FFFF) Maximum number of Logical Volumes per Symmetrix configuration = 8192
While hyper -volume and split refer to the same thing (a portion of a Symmetrix physical drive), a logical volume is a slightly different concept. A logical volume is the disk entity presented to a host via a Symmetrix channel director port. As far as the host is concerned, the Symmetrix Logical Volume is a physical drive. Do not confuse Symmetrix Logical Volumes with host-based logical volumes. Symmetrix Logical Volumes are defined by the Symmetrix Configuration (BIN File). From the Symmetrix perspective, physical disk drives are being partitioned into Hyper Volumes. A Hyper Volume could be used as an unprotected Symmetrix Logical Volume, a mirror of a Symmetrix Logical Volume, a Business Continuance Volume (BCV), a parity volume for Parity RAID, a remote mirror using SRDF, a Disk Reallocation Volume (DRV), etc. Host-based logical volumes are configured by customers through Logical Volume Manager software (Veritas LVM, NT Disk Administrator, ...etc.). Note: In actuality, the true useable capacity of the drive would be less than 18GB due to disk formatting and overhead (track tables, etc.). This would result in each of the 4 splits in this example being approximately 4.21GB in size (open systems).
Symmetrix Logical Volume Specifications

Physical Disk Physical Disk Physical Disk Physical Disk Physical Disk
z Volume Specifications vary with Enginuity level
Enginuity allows up to 128 Hyper Volumes to be configured from a single Physical Drive Size of Volumes defined as number of Cylinders (FBA Cylinder = 15 * 32K), with a max. size ~32 GB All Hyper Volumes on a physical disk do not have to be the same size however a consistent size makes planning and ongoing management easier

Volume specifications are illustrated here.
Defining Symmetrix Logical Volumes

Physical Disk Physical Disk Physical Disk Physical Disk Physical Disk
Symmetrix Service Processor
Running SymmWin Application
z Symmetrix Logical Volumes are configured using the service
processor and SymmWin interface/application
EMC Configuration Group uses information gathered during pre-site survey to create initial configuration
Generate configuration file (IMPL.BIN) that is downloaded from the service processor to each director
z Most configuration changes can be performed on-line at the
discretion of the EMC Customer Engineer
z Configuration changes can be performed online using the
EMC ControlCenter Configuration Manager and Solutions Enabler Command Line Interface
33

The C4 group (Configuration and Change Control Committee) is the division of Global Services responsible for initial Symmetrix configuration and any subsequent changes to the configuration. They use time-honored and extensive best practices and tools to configure Symmetrix. There is also much manual review to be done to ensure that BIN files are valid. An important misperception to correct is that only the CE can change the bin-file. While this might have been true at one time, today the customer may make configuration changes using EMC ControlCenter GUI or the Solutions Enabler CLI. Prior to 5x66 Enginuity, BIN file configuration was performed using a DOS-based program called AnatMain.
Symmetrix Logical Volume Types

z Open Systems hosts use Fixed Block Architecture (FBA)
Each block is a fixed size of 512 bytes Data Block Sector = 8 Blocks (4,096 Bytes) 512 Bytes Track = 8 Sectors (32,768 Bytes) Cylinder = 15 Tracks (491,520 Bytes) Volume size referred to by the number of Cylinders
z Mainframes use Count Key Data (CKD)
Variable block size specified in count Emulate Standard IBM volumes

3380D, E, K, K+, K++ (max. track size 47,476 bytes) 3390-1, -2, -3, -9 (max. track size ~ 56,664 bytes) Volume size defined as a number of Cylinders
Count Key
Data
z Symmetrix stores data in cache in FBA and CKD and on physical
disk in FBA format (32 KB tracks)
Emulates expected disk geometry to host OS through Channel Directors

A notable exception to the 512-byte Open Systems rule is AS/400. It uses 520 bytes per block. The extra 8 bytes are for host system overhead. Enginuity, prior to 5566 on the Symmetrix 5, only supports a single type of FBA format on Open Systems drives. If you connect an AS/400 to a pre-5566 Symmetrix, all FBA devices must be formatted 520. Open Systems hosts other than the AS/400 must be configured to use 520-formatted volumes. BE AWARE THAT CHANGING THE LOW-LEVEL FORMAT OF PHYSICAL DEVICES TYPICALLY REQUIRES SYMMETRIX DOWNTIME. Also, reformatting existing 512 devices will erase them, requiring a potentially complex backup and restore of all Open Systems data. With 5566+ on Symm 5 +, Enginuity has SLLF (Selective Low-Level Format) capabilities. This allows some drives to be formatted 512 and others 520, avoiding the complications mentioned above. The primary use for cache is for staging and destaging data between the host and the disk drives. Cache is allocated in tracks and is referred to as cache slots, which are 32Kbytes in size (57 Kbytes for Mainframe). If the Symmetrix is supporting both FBA and CKD emulation within the same frame, the cache slots will be the size of the largest track size, 57K (3390) track size.
Meta Volumes
z Between 2 and 255* Symmetrix
Logical Volumes can be grouped into a Meta Volume configuration and presented to Open System hosts as a single disk current maximum hyper volume size of 32GB
Satisfies requirements for environments where there is a limited number of host addresses or volume labels available
Logical Volume 001 Logical Volume 002 Logical Volume 003 Logical Volume 00F
Meta Volume
LV 001 LV 002 LV 003 LV 00F
z Allows volumes larger than the
z Data is striped or concatenated
within the Meta Volume
z Stripe size is configurable
2 Cylinders is the default size, which is appropriate for most environments

*Note: Symmetrix Engineering recommends Meta Volumes no larger than 512GB
35
Meta Volumes allow customers to present larger Symmetrix Logical Volumes to the host environment. They are able to present more GBs with fewer channel addresses. There is a limitation on the number of volumes a host can manage. For example, with NT, the Drive lettering puts a limit on the number of volumes, and Meta Volumes prevent running out of drive letters by presenting larger volumes to NT hosts.
Data Protection
z Data protection options are configured at the volume level and the same
system can employ a variety of protection schemes
Mirroring (RAID 1)
Highest performance, availability and functionality Two mirrors of one Symmetrix Logical Volume located on separate physical drives
Parity RAID
3 +1 (3 data and 1 parity volume) or 7 +1 (7 data and 1 parity volume) Formerly known as RAID S or RAID R
RAID 5 Striped RAID Volumes

Data blocks are striped horizontally across the members of the RAID (4 or 8 volume) group No separate parity drive, parity blocks rotate among the group members
RAID 10 Mirrored Striped Mainframe Volumes Dynamic Sparing

One or more HDAs that are used when Symmetrix detects a potentially failing (or failed) device Can be utilized to augment data protection scheme Minimizes exposure after a drive failure and before drive replacement
SRDF (Symmetrix Remote Data Facility)

Mirror of Symmetrix Logical Volume maintained in separate Symmetrix frame

RAID - Redundant Array of Independent Disks The RAID Advisory Board has rated configurations with both SRDF and either Parity RAID or RAID 1 Mirroring with the highest availability and protection classification: Disaster Tolerant Disk System Plus (DTDS+) See http://www.raid-advisory.com/emc.html for the ratings.
Mirroring: RAID-1
z Two physical copies or mirrors of the data z Host is unaware of data protection being applied
Disk Director
Physical Drive
Logical Volume 001
Different Disk Director

Physical Drive LV 001 M2
Host Address Target = 1 LUN = 0

LV 001 M1
Mirroring provides the highest level of performance and availability for all applications. Mirroring maintains a duplicate copy of a logical volume on two physical drives. The Symmetrix maintains these copies internally by writing all modified data to both physical locations. The mirroring function is transparent to attached hosts, as the hosts view the mirrored pair of hypers as a single logical volume. Prior to the Symmetrix DMX, mirrors were configured with what is known as the rule of 17. Because of where within the card cage the DA pairs reside (1/2, 3/4, 13/14, 15/16), as long as the sum of the DA director numbers equals 17 (1/16, 2/15, 3/14, 4/13), the mirrors will always be on different internal system buses for the highest availability and maximum Symmetrix resources. The Symmetrix DMX uses the rule of 17 for director failover pairing, and not volume mirroring. The point-to-point connections with cache eliminate the need for protection against a bus failure while mirroring volumes.
Mirror Positions
z Internally each Symmetrix Logical Volume is represented by four
mirror positions M1, M2, M3, M4
z Mirror position are actually data structures that point to a physical
location of a mirror of the data and status of each track unused
z Each mirror positions represents a mirror copy of the volume or is
Symmetrix Logical Volume 001
M1
M2
M3
M4
38
Before getting too far into volume configuration, understanding the concept of mirror positions is very important. Within the Symmetrix, each logical volume is represented by four mirror positions M1, M2, M3, M4. These Mirror Positions are actually data structures that point to a physical location of a data mirror and the status of each track. In the case of SRDF, the mirror position actually points to a Logical Volume in the remote Symmetrix. Each position either represents a mirror or is unused. For example, an unprotected volume will only use the M1 position to point to the only data copy. A RAID-1 protected volume will use the M1 and M2 positions. If this volume was also protected with SRDF, three mirror positions would be used, and if we add a BCV to this SRDF protected RAID-1 volume, all four mirror positions would be used.
Mirrored Service Policy

Physical Drive LV 000 M1 LV 004 M1 LV 008 M1 LV 00C M1 Logical Volume 008 Logical Volume 00C Logical Volume 000 Logical Volume 004 Physical Drive LV 000 M2 LV 004M2 LV 008 M2 LV 00C M2
z Symmetrix leverages either or both mirrors of a Logical Volume to fulfill
read requests as quickly and efficiently as possible z Two options for mirror reads: Interleave and Split
Interleave maximizes throughput by using both Hyper Volumes for reads alternately Split minimizes head movement by targeting reads for specific volumes to either M1 or M2 mirror
z Dynamic Mirror Service Policy (DMSP): policy is dynamically adjusted
based on I/O patterns
Adjusted approximately every 5 minutes Set at a logical volume level

During a read operation, if data is not available in cache memory, the Symmetrix reads the data from the volume chosen for best overall system performance. Performance algorithms within Enginuity track path-busy information, as well as the actuator location, and which sector is currently under the disk head in each device. Symmetrix performance algorithms for a read operation choose the best volume in the mirrored pair based on these service policies.
Interleave Service Policy Share the read operations of a mirror pair by reading tracks from both logical volumes in an alternating method: a number of tracks from the primary volume (M1) and a number of tracks from the secondary volume (M2). The Interleave Service Policy is designed to achieve maximum throughput. Split Service Policy Different from the Interleave Service Policy because read operations are assigned to either the M1 or the M2 logical volumes, but not both. Split Service policy is designed to minimize head movement. Dynamic Mirror Service Policy (DMSP) -DMSP dynamically chooses between the Interleave and Split policies at the logical volume level based on current performance and environmental variables, for maximum throughput and minimum head movement. DMSP adjusts each logical volume dynamically based on recent access patterns. This is the default mode. The Symmetrix system tracks I/O performance of logical volumes (including BCVs), physical disks, and disk directors. Based on these measurements, it directs read operation for mirrored data to the appropriate mirror. As the access patterns and workloads change, the DMSP algorithm analyzes the new workload and adjusts the service policy to optimize performance.
Symmetrix RAID 10 (Mirrored Striped Mainframe Volumes with DMSP)

To improve mainframe volume performance, Symmetrix RAID 10 stripes data of logical devices across multiple Symmetrix logical devices. Four Symmetrix devices (each one-fourth the size of the original mainframe device) appear as one mainframe device to the host. Any four Symmetrix logical devices can be chosen to define a RAID 10 group provided they are the same type (for example, IBM 3390) and have the same mirror configuration. Striping occurs across this group of four devices with a striping unit of one cylinder, as shown in the diagram. Since each member of the stripe group is mirrored, the entire set is protected. Dynamic Mirror Service Policy (DMSP) can then be applied to the mirrored devices. The combination of DMSP with mirrored striping and concatenation to create a mainframe volume as illustrated, enables greatly improved performance in mainframe system
Symmetrix RAID-10 Meta volume

Host I/O M1 M2
Vol A
Vol A
Vol A
Vol A
Cylinders 1, 5, 9..
Cylinders 2, 6, 10..
DMSP
Cylinders 1, 5, 9..
Vol A
Vol A
Vol A
Vol A
41
This is a diagram of a RAID-10 stripe group. The portion of the logical volume which resides on one physical volume is called a stripe. Each RAID-10 stripe group consist of four stripes distributed across four physical volumes. These are mirrored to consist of eight total physical volumes. The stripe group is constructed by alternately placing one cylinder across each of the four physical volumes. These physical volumes cannot be on the same DA. The eight physical volumes are distributed across the Symmetrix back end for additional availability and improved performance. The DMSP feature, which is available in all Symmetrix systems, allows the Enginuity algorithms to dynamically optimize how the read requests can be satisfied over any of the eight physical devices.
Symmetrix Parity RAID
Vol A
Vol B
Vol C
Parity ABC
3 Host addressable volumes
Not host addressable
3 +1 (3 data volumes and 1 parity volume) or 7 +1. Parity calculated by Symmetrix Disk Drives using Exclusive-OR
(XOR) function. Parity and difference data (result of XOR calculations) passed between drives by DAs. Member drives must be on different DA ports (ideally on different DAs). Parity volumes distributed across member drives in RAID Group.
Parity RAID is also referred to as RAID-S in Symmetrix 5 and earlier architectures. EMCs Parity RAID DOES NOT STRIPE DATA. Parity RAID employs the same technique for generating parity information as many other commercially available RAID solutions, that is, the Boolean operation EXCLUSIVE OR (XOR). However, EMCs Parity RAID implementation reduces the overhead associated with parity computation by moving the operation from controller microcode to the hardware on the XOR-capable disk drives. Symmetrix Parity RAID is not offered as a performance solution

For high data availability environments where cost and performance must be balanced Fixed 3 + 1 configuration means 25% of disk space used for protection Avoid in application environments that are 25% or greater write intensive Every write to a data volume requires an update (write) to the parity volume within that rank or group Write activity to the parity volume equals the total writes to the 3 data volumes within that rank or group In write intensive environments, the parity volume is likely to reach its Fast Write Ceiling sending the entire rank into delayed write mode
If customer requirements dictate using Parity RAID, planning and careful attention to layout is required to ensure optimal performance. In some configurations, Parity RAID in a DMX environment may perform as well as RAID 1 protection on a Symmetrix 8000
Symmetrix RAID-5 (4 members)
Volume A 1 Host Addressable volume
Parity 123 Data 4 Data 7
Data 1 Parity 456 Data 8
Data 2 Data 5 Parity 789
Data 3 Data 6 Data 9
Volume A with parity rotated among members

Raid-5 Groups can have 4 or 8 members per logical device

4 members per logical device = 3 RAID-5 8 members per logical device = 7 RAID-5
This example shows a single Logical volume in a Raid-5 Group (Stripe width is 4 tracks). Note that the data and parity tracks of a RAID-5 device are striped across 4 members. No separate parity drive or volume; parity blocks rotate among the group members
Dynamic Sparing
Dynamic Spare
z Dedicated spare(s) disk protects storage z Disk errors are detected during I/O
operations or through DAs Disk Scrubbing Spare
z Data from failed disk is copied to Dynamic z When failed disk is replaced, data is
automatically restored and Dynamic Spare resumes role as standby

Every Symmetrix logical volume has 4 mirror positions. There is no priority associated with any of these positions. They simply point to potential physical locations on the back end of the Symmetrix for the logical volume entity. When sparing is necessitated, hyper volumes on the spare disk devices take the next available mirror position for the logical volumes present on the failing volume. All of these dynamic spare hyper volumes are marked as having all tracks invalid in the respective mirror positions of the logical volumes. It is now the responsibility of the Symmetrix to copy all tracks over to the Dynamic Spare. Dynamic sparing occurs at the physical drive level, since a physical drive is the FRU (Field Replaceable Unit) in the Symmetrix. In other words, you cant just replace a failed hyper volume, only the disk it resides on. However, the actual data migration from the volumes on the failed drive to the dynamic spare occurs at the logical volume level. Dynamic Sparing is also supported with Parity RAID, a minimum of 3 spares is suggested. If a drive fails, a dynamic spare drive will copy the data volumes onto itself by rebuilding them from parity and reading from any remaining uncorrupted data. If there are at least 3 spares available, the 1st spare will also start copying data from uncorrupted drives in the group. The other 2 spares will copy the contents of the remaining data volumes on the unaffected drives in the group. This results in the formerly parity-protected volumes now being temporarily mirrored. Since parity cant be calculated with a drive lost, and mirroring is a faster way to make sure the data is redundantly protected, mirroring the entire RAID group results in the best way to protect against data loss until the problematic drive can be replaced.
SRDF Introduction
z Symmetrix Remote Data Facility (SRDF) maintains real-time or near
real-time copy of data at remote location Symmetrix
z Similar concept as RAID-1 except mirror is located in a different z Primary copy is called Source, remote copy is called Target z Link options between local and remote Symmetrix based on distance
and performance requirements

ESCON Fibre Channel Gigabit Ethernet
Source
Target

SRDF is an online, host-independent, mirrored data storage solution that duplicates production site data (source) to a secondary site (target). If the production site becomes inoperable, SRDF enables rapid manual fail over to the secondary site, allowing critical data to be available to the business operation in minutes. While it is easy to see this as a disaster recovery solution, the remote copy can also be used for business continuance during planned outages as well as backups, testing, and decision support applications. EMC offers a complete set of replication solutions to meet a wide range of service level requirements. When implementing a remote replication solution, users must balance application response time, recovery point objectives, and communications and infrastructure costs.
TimeFinder Introduction
z TimeFinder allows local
replication of Symmetrix Logical Volumes for business continuance operations Logical volume called a BCV or Business Continuance Volume
BCV can be dynamically attached to another volume, synchronized, and split off Host can access BCV as an independent volume that may be used for business continuance operations Full volume copy
STD BCV
z Utilizes special Symmetrix
BCV Established
STD
BCV
BCV Split
1. Establish BCV 2. Synchronized 3. Split BCV 4. Execute BC operations using BCV
46

TimeFinder uses Business Continuance Volumes (BCVs) to create copies of a volume for parallel processing. Basic TimeFinder operations include:
Establish Mirror relationship between any standard volume and BCV. Basically, the BCV assumes the next available mirror position of the source volume. While a BCV is established, it is hidden from view and cannot be accessed. Synchronize data from Source to BCV. Synchronization will take place while production continues on the source volume. TimeFinder supports incremental establish by default where only changed data since the last establish is synchronized. Split allows the BCV to be accessed as an independent volume for parallel processing. Restore allows the BCV to be established as a mirror to either the original source or a different volume and the data on the BCV is synchronized.
EMC SNAP Introduction

z EMC SNAP uses Snapshot techniques
Production view of volume Volume A
to create logical point-in-time images of a source volume

Snapshot is a virtual abstraction of a volume Multiple Snapshots can be created from same source Snapshots are available immediately
z EMC SNAP does a Copy-on-Write
Writes to production volume are first copied to Save Area Uses only a fraction of the source volumes capacity (~2030%)
z Snapshots can be used for both read
Snapshot of Volume A (VDEV) Save Area
Snapshot view of volume
and write processing
Original data copied to Save Area prior to new production writes
Reads of unchanged data will be from Production volume Changed data will be read from Save Area
47
EMC Snap creates space-saving, logical point-in-time images or snapshots. The snapshots are not full copies of data; they are logical images of the original information based on the time the snapshot was created. Its simply a view into the data. A set of pointers to the source volume data tracks is created instantly upon activation of the snapshot. This set of pointers is addressed as a logical volume and is made accessible to a secondary host that uses the point-in-time image of the data.
Symmetrix Availability: Phone-Home and Dial-In

z EMC Phone-Home capability
Service Processor connects to external modem Communicates error and diagnostic information to EMC Customer Service Provides problem resolution
z Dial-In capability
Product Support Engineer (PSE) or Customer Engineer (CE) dial-in Allows full control of service processor through proprietary and secure interface Allows for proactive and reactive maintenance Can be disabled by customer through external modem

Every Symmetrix unit has an integrated service processor that continuously monitors the Symmetrix environment. The service processor communicates with the EMC Customer Support Center through a customer-supplied, direct phone line. The service processor automatically dials the Customer Support Center whenever Symmetrix detects a component failure or environmental violation. An EMC Product Support Engineer at the Customer Support Center can also run diagnostics remotely through the service processor to determine the source of a problem and potentially resolve it before the problem becomes critical. When required, a Customer Engineers will be dispatched to the Symmetrix to replace hardware or perform other maintenance.
Course Summary
The key points covered in this course include:
z Redundancy in the hardware design, and intelligence through
Enginuity, allow Symmetrix to provide the highest levels of data availability areas (Front End, Back End and Shared Global Memory) connected by internal system buses write, delayed write)
z Symmetrix basic architecture is comprised of three functional
z All I/O must be serviced through cache (read hit, read miss, fast z Symmetrix physical disk drives are divided into Hyper Volumes,
which form Symmetrix Logical Volumes, that are presented to the host environment as if they were entire physical drives protection options available on Symmetrix
z Mirroring, Parity RAID, SRDF, and Dynamic Sparing are all media
These are some of the main features of the Symmetrix. Please take a moment to read them.
Closing Slide

Thank you for your attention. This ends our training on Symmetrix Foundations.

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Symmetrix Foundations, 1

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Audio Portion of this Course

z EMC recommends downloading the Student Resource

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

EMC Technology Foundations

overviews of EMC products and technologies including:

z ILM uses EMC technologies to enable organizations to better, and more

z This course represents one part of the ETF curriculum

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Integrated Cached Disk Array (ICDA)

z Identify the front-end, back-end, cache, and physical

disk drives and Symmetrix Logical Volumes Symmetrix

z Identify the media protection options available on the

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Symmetrix Integrated Cached Disk Array

and availability in the industry z Consolidation

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Enginuity Operating Environment

Symmetrix Based Applications Host Based Management Software ISV Software

Solutions Enabler Management Enginuity Operating Environment Symmetrix Hardware

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Symmetrix Card Cage

DMX1000 Maximum Front End Directors

DMX2000 Maximum Cache Directors

DMX3000 Maximum Cache Maximum Disk Drives

Maximum Back End Directors

64GB 128GB 128GB 256GB 256GB 256GB 64GB 64GB 32GB

120 144 144 288 288 576 384 96 48

2004 EMC Corporation. All rights reserved.

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Data path through Symmetrix

Data destaged from cache

EMC Global Education

There are three functional areas:

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Direct Matrix Architecture

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Symmetrix DMX Architecture

Separate Control and Communications Message Matrix

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

DMX Director Pairing

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

DMX: Dual-ported Disk and Redundant Directors

S P = Primary Connection to Drive S= Secondary Connection for Redundancy

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Back-end Director Pairing 9-drive loop

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

DMX800 Architectural Overview

EMC Global Education

Copyright 2004 EMC Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Symmetrix 5.X LVD Architecture