VNX2 Storage Management and Administration

VNX2 STORAGE MANAGEMENT
AND ADMINISTRATION
VNX2 Storage Management and Administration
Table of Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................................. 4
Business Challenge..........................................................................................................................................5
Solution ...........................................................................................................................................................6
Key Components........................................................................................................................................... 7
Multicore FAST Cache .......................................................................................................................................8
Multicore Cache ...............................................................................................................................................9
Block Deduplication .......................................................................................................................................10
Hot Spare Policies ..........................................................................................................................................11
FAST VP..........................................................................................................................................................12
VNX Snapshots ..............................................................................................................................................13
Data at Rest Encryption ..................................................................................................................................14
Lab Overview .............................................................................................................................................. 15

Lab Environment ............................................................................................................................................16
Lab Scenario ..................................................................................................................................................17
Labs...............................................................................................................................................................18
Lab 1 - Login to Unisphere .......................................................................................................................... 19

Logging into EMC Unisphere...........................................................................................................................20
Alerts and System Components......................................................................................................................25
Lab 2 - Virtual Provisioning ......................................................................................................................... 34

Creating a Mixed Pool ....................................................................................................................................35
Creating a Thin LUN ........................................................................................................................................42
Assigning a LUN to a Host ..............................................................................................................................48
Hot Spare Policy.............................................................................................................................................54
Lab 3 - File Systems and Shares.................................................................................................................. 66

Creating a File System ....................................................................................................................................67
Creating a CIFS Server and CIFS Share ............................................................................................................72
Lab 4 - Multicore Cache and Multicore FAST Cache...................................................................................... 83

Multicore Cache Features ...............................................................................................................................84
Configuring FAST Cache..................................................................................................................................87
Lab 5 - FAST VP ........................................................................................................................................... 91

Creating LUNs with Different Tiering Policies...................................................................................................92
Lab 6 - Snapshots..................................................................................................................................... 112

Local Rapid Restore......................................................................................................................................113
Creating Snapshots......................................................................................................................................126
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 132

Final Words ..................................................................................................................................................133
Introduction
Page 4
Business Challenge
About
BIG Telco company is a major telecommunications company in the United States with a strong presence throughout
the world with significant development shops in India and Bolivia. They are greatly diversified across communications
infrastructure as well as the newer wireless infrastructure around the United States and Canada. BIG Telco company
has also begun establishing themselves in hosting facilities and recently invested millions into a state of the art
datacenter located in the Middle East.
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Solution
BIG Telco has chosen a VNX5400 Unified storage system to store its business-critical information because of
the product's reliability, robustness, and ease-of-use.
EMC's VNX Virtual Provisioning, Fully Automated Storage Tiering for Virtual Pools (FAST VP), Multicore FAST
Cache, Block Deduplication, VNX Snapshots, and Hot Spare Policies are the features that will be used to
solve this business challenge.
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Key Components
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Multicore FAST Cache

Multicore FAST Cache makes the most efficient use of Flash drive capacity by using Flash drives for the most
frequently accessed data in the storage system instead of dedicating those drives to a particular storage
pool. It provides a large secondary cache area with a 64KB page size that can be configured in much larger
capacities than what's available in system cache. This results in a system-wide performance increase when
there is small-block random I/O with a high locality of reference.
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Multicore Cache
The VNX2 systems' Multicore Cache is a software component that increases host write and read performance
by better optimizing the VNX storage processors' DRAM. Multicore Cache is adaptive, meaning that memory
is not designated for separate read and write caches. This allocation is done intelligently and automatically.
Read caching is always enabled and write caching is enabled by default.
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Block Deduplication
Block Deduplication is a storage efficiency feature that frees space by eliminating common copies of data at
the 8 KB block level. Block Deduplication compares 8KB blocks and determines where duplicate blocks
exist. LUN mappings are then updated to point to the location of a single block and duplicate blocks are
eliminated. Block Deduplication runs at the pool level, comparing 8KB blocks within all deduplication
enabled LUNs within the pool. When enough blocks are deduplicated, free space is returned to the pool to
be used by other storage resources in the future. Deduplication can provide great space savings in
situations where duplicate data is present.
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Hot Spare Policies

With VNX2 there is no need to configure hot spares, as the system automatically replaces a failed drive with
a suitable spare. This drive then becomes a permanent replacement for the failed drive. A Hot Spare Policy
monitors the number of unbound drives (potential spare drives) of a certain type in the system, and posts a
warning when that number is low. When selecting disks for a new pool, the system will not allow the user to
select a number of drives that would violate the Hot Spare Policy for that drive type. The default
recommended Hot Spare Policy in VNX2 is 1 per 30. This means that the system will reserve 1 drive as a hot
spare for every 30 drives of that type. Once there are more than 30 drives of a certain type, the system will
begin reserving 2 drives for potential hot spares. Hot Spare Policies can also be customized or turned off.
However, turning off a policy only stops monitoring, drives will still spare in the event of a failure.
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FAST VP
Fully Automated Storage Tiering for Virtual Pools (FAST VP) lets you assign different tiering policies within a
pool. Tiering policies may be based on performance requirements, frequency of use, cost, and other
considerations. The purpose of the FAST VP feature is to retain the most frequently accessed or important
data on fast, high-performance (more expensive) drives, and move the less frequently accessed data to
lower-performance (less expensive) drives. Data is evaluated and relocated at a granularity of 256MB.
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VNX Snapshots
VNX Snapshots is an EMC VNX software feature that enables you to create and manage snapshots, which are
point-in-time views of a LUN. VNX Snapshots uses redirect on write (ROW) technology. With this technology,
new writes to the source LUN do not require snapped blocks to be copied to a new location. Instead, new
blocks are written to a new location within in the storage pool, and only the index for the data changes.
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Data at Rest Encryption

As data continues to grow exponentially, one of any organization's biggest challenges continues to be data
security. To address this issue, the VNX2 Series provides Data at Rest Encryption (D@RE), a technology that
encrypts data as it's written to disk. Encryption and decryption occur at the SAS controller level, making this
feature compatible with all drive types. D@RE is turned on at the array level, and ensures all user data is
protected in the case that a drive is stolen or misplaced.
While existing VNX2 systems support data-in-place upgrades to D@RE, new VNX2 systems can be shipped
with D@RE already enabled so that the storage administrator does not need to manually enable encryption.
Though enabling encryption can easily be performed through Unisphere and Unisphere service manager, the
process may take more time than this Hands on Lab allows. Because of this D@RE will not be covered in this
lab.
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Lab Overview
Page 15
Lab Environment
The following lab will be run on a Virtual Storage Appliance (VSA), which is a virtualized instance of a VNX2
system. Please be aware that the performance of the VSA will not be the same as actual hardware and some
tasks may take longer to run. There are also limitations, such as smaller disk sizes, that do not exist when
using a physical VNX2 storage system.
192.168.1.30 - VNX2 SPA
192.168.1.31 - VNX2 SPB
192.168.1.32 - VNX2 Control Station
192.168.1.250 - India Marketing Team Server/DC
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Lab Scenario
You are currently a new Storage Administrator at BIG Telco company and you are in charge of all daily storage
provisioning activities. With these duties, you are responsible for providing the most efficient data
resources along with data protection services. After arriving to the office this morning, you turn on your
computer and find an email from your boss, Joe, asking you to complete a small project for the office in
India. The email reads:
Good morning,
Last night, I received a request from the marketing team in India asking for more storage for their new social
media project. They are starting to make an entrance in the social media world but need to do some more
research first. They would like some storage for all of their daily reports that they'll develop for their findings.
They already have some storage that we gave them last year for all of their marketing research data but
would like more room specifically for these daily reports.
They also mentioned that in the near future, they plan to gather user statistics, create weekly reports on how
successful this project has been, and post pictures, videos, and other media to social media websites. You
will need to provision them storage for each one of these categories.
Please try to preserve space as much as possible when provisioning this storage and please provide me with
an update by the end of the day.
Thanks,
Joe
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Labs
This following labs will be completed:
Lab 1 - Login to Unisphere - Login to Unisphere for VNX2
Lab 2 - Virtual Provisioning - Provision a LUN from a Storage Pool, give access to a host, and change
Hot Spare Policies.
Lab 3 - File Systems and Shares - Provision file storage by creating a File System, CIFS Server, and
CIFS Share.
Lab 4 - Multicore Cache and Multicore FAST Cache - Become familiar with the benefits of Multicore
Cache and Multicore FAST Cache, and create FAST Cache.
Lab 5 - FAST VP - Provision additional LUNs with various tiering policies to take advantage of the
automatic tiering capabilities of FAST VP.
Lab 6 - Snapshots - Learn how to create snapshots and restore a LUN from a previously created
snapshot.
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Lab 1 - Login to Unisphere
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Logging into EMC Unisphere

After reading the email from your boss, you get right to work. It is currently off hours in India so this is a
perfect time to get everything done so they will be ready to go once they get in the office. Since you will be
performing many storage management tasks, you start by using EMC Unisphere. EMC Unisphere is the single
management interface for managing VNX systems. For this project, you will login to the VNX5400 array that
India's storage resides on.
Open Browser
From the desktop, double-click the icon that is labeled VNX Unisphere.
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Accept the Certificate Warning

If you are presented with a security warning, click Continue to this website to continue to Unisphere.
Accept the Security Warning

If you see a pop-up security warning:
Click the check box and click Run
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Accept the User Agreement

Click on the Accept button when the user agreement appears.
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Login to Unisphere
Enter the user credentials as:
1. Name: sysadmin
2. Password: sysadmin
3. Click Login
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Select the System

In the Systems by Severity section, select the VNX5400 array to be taken to the array Dashboard page.
Note: The alerts you see may differ from those shown below.
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Alerts and System Components

Now that you've logged in, you decide to take a quick look around Unisphere. You want to determine the
status of the system and its components to make sure you've all set to begin provisioning.
Note: Through the remainder of this and the other labs, you may need to resize the columns in Unisphere to
see all information. You can do this by clicking and dragging the lines between columns.
Go to the Alerts Page

On the Dashboard page you can see a list of System Alerts on the left hand side as well as general System Information
on the right hand side.
Click Show All to go to the Alerts page.
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Select an Alert
This is the Alerts page, where you can view, delete, and get more information about system alerts. Take a look at one
of the alerts.
1. Click on an alert
2. Click Details
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View Alert Details

This opens an Alert Details pop-up window giving more information about the selected alert. Click OK to close the
window.
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Delete an Alert
You can also delete certain alerts on this page.Click Delete to delete the selected alert.
Note: All alerts shown may not be deletable. If your selected alert cannot be deleted, select another alert to delete.
Confirm Deletion
Click Yes
Yes.
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Verify Deletion
You can see that the alert has disappeared from the list.
Navigate to Storage Hardware Page

You can also view the health of individual storage system components in Unisphere.
1. Hover over System
2. Click Storage Hardware
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View Storage Hardware Page

On this page, you can drill down to view the status of individual hardware components. The graphics on the right
highlight the location of an enclosure's component when the name is clicked on the left. Additional properties of
various components can also be viewed by selecting a component and clicking Properties.
Select Components
Expand some of the components in the list by clicking on the +. Some components allow you to drill down multiple
levels. The component's state is shown in the State column. Notice that selecting a component name will highlight
that component on the right side, with some exceptions. After clicking around the component list:
1. Ensure SPs is expanded
2. Select SP A
3. Click Properties
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View Component Properties

The SP Properties window appear which shows more detailed information. A similar window exists for many of the
other storage system components, and the information is specific to the type of component
Click OK to close the window.
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Return to the Dashboard

Click on the Dashboard tab to return to the Dashboard page.
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Lab 2 - Virtual Provisioning
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Creating a Mixed Pool

After looking back at the email that Joe sent, the first thing that you need to do is provision storage for the
marketing team in India to store all of their daily reports for their research on social media. For this, you
decide the best thing to do is use VNX Virtual Provisioning because it provides pool-based storage
provisioning by implementing pool LUNs that can be either Thick or Thin. In VNX2, Thin is the default option
when creating a LUN. You aren't sure how much data the marketing team will have and how much research
they plan on doing, so you will create a Thin LUN. Thin LUNs are perfect for situations like this where it is
difficult to forecast the storage requirements. Once the LUN has been created, you will present it to the India
Marketing Team host.
Navigate to the Storage Pools Page

1. From the top menu, hover over Storage
2. Select Storage Pools
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Create a Storage Pool

In the Pools window, click Create
Create.
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Configure the Pool

In the Create Storage Pool window that appears, you will be able to create the Storage Pool. Configure the pool with
the following settings:
1. Name the pool Marketing - Social Media
2. Leave the disk count for each tier as the default recommended
3. Click OK
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Confirm Creation
You will immediately be prompted to initiate the creation of the storage pool.
Click Yes to continue with this operation.
Accept the Warning

You will be warned that the FAST Cache is not yet configured.
Click Yes to continue as we will configure this later.
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Creation in Progress
You will be notified that the operation is in progress.
Click OK to continue.
Verify Pool is Ready

After a few minutes, verify that your newly created Storage Pool is present in the Pools section. Check that the State is
labeled as Ready and view the RAID Type and Total Capacity.
Please Note: For the pool state to change from Initializing to Ready, you may have to refresh the screen using the green
refresh button in the top right.
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View Pool Properties

To get more details about the pool:
1. Select the Marketing - Social Media pool
2. Click the Properties button
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View Disks
1. In the Storage Pool Properties
Properties, click the Disks tab and verify that all three types of drives are present
2. Once done, click OK to exit the properties window
Please Note
Note: You can sort the list by Drive Type by clicking the column header.
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Creating a Thin LUN

Navigate to the LUNs Page
In the top menu:
1. Hover over Storage
2. Select LUNs
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Create a LUN
At the bottom of the LUNs window, select the Create button.
Choose Parameters
In VNX2, the default LUN type has been changed to Thin because of the capacity optimization provided by Thin LUNs.
You decide that it is better to allocate LUN space on demand in this situation, so you will keep the default of Thin.
In the window that appears, make the following selections:
1. Ensure the Marketing - Social Media Pool is selected
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2.
3.
4.
5.
Note that the Thin checkbox is checked by default

Specify a User Capacity of 80GB
Select the radio button for Name and call the LUN Marketing - Social Media Daily Reports
Click Apply to make the changes
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Confirm Creation
Once you apply the configuration, you will be asked if you wish to continue. Click Yes to continue.
Creation Initiated
You will be notified that the creation of the LUN was initiated. Click OK to continue.
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Close the Window

After the LUN has been created, you can exit out of the Create LUN window by clicking Cancel
Cancel.
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Verify the LUN is Ready

In the LUNs tab, locate the Marketing - Social Media Daily Reports LUN that you just created and verify that the State is
labeled as Ready and check that the User Capacity is 80GB
80GB. You may have to click the refresh button in the top right.
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Assigning a LUN to a Host

Now that you have created the storage, you will use the Storage Groups to assign the newly created LUN to
the existing India Marketing Team host.
Navigate to the Storage Groups Page

In the top menu bar:
1. Hover over Hosts
2. Click Storage Groups
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Connect LUNs
On the Storage Groups page:
1. Select the India storage group
2. Click Connect LUNs
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Add the LUN

1. Expand both SP A and SP B to find the Marketing - Social Media Daily Reports LUN
2. Select the Marketing - Social Media Daily Reports LUN
3. Click Add
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Verify Selected LUNs

1. Verify the Marketing - Social Media Daily Reports LUN is now shown under Selected LUNs
2. Click OK
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Continue
Click Yes.
Success
Verify the task was successful and click OK
OK.
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Verify Host Access

At the bottom of the page:
1. Click the LUNs tab
2. Verify that the Marketing - Social Media Daily Reports LUN is now shown as part of the India storage group.
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Hot Spare Policy

After provisioning storage and giving the India team access to the LUN, you check your email and find
another email from Joe:
Good Afternoon,
I wanted to let you know that I just ordered some additional Flash drives for the VNX2. In order to ensure
quick replacement in the event of drive failures, I want you to make sure that we will always have at least 2
spare unbound flash drives in the array once the new drives are added. Can you please take care of this?
Thanks,
Joe
You decide that the easy way to achieve this is to use a Hot Spare Policy in Unisphere. Because any suitable
unbound drive can now be used as a permanent spare, Hot Spare Policies are used to monitor the number of
unbound drives. This is intended to prevent unwanted situations where no hot spares are unintentionally left
on the array.
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Navigate to the Hot Spare Policy Page

1. Hover over System
2. Click Hot Spare Policy
Review Policies
Note the Recommended Hot Spare Policy is 1 per 30 disks.
Click NL SAS
SAS. The Hot Spare Policy for the NL SAS drives has already been changed to No Hot Spares
Spares.
Note that this does not mean there will be no hot spares for NL SAS drives. Any unbound drive will still be used as a
hot spare in the event of a drive failure. No Hot Spares only means the Hot Spare Policy will not reserve any drives to
be a hot spare and you will not be warned if all of the drives are bound.
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SAS Flash
Click SAS Flash
Flash.
Set a Custom Policy

Change the Hot Spare Policy for SAS Flash drives from Recommended to Custom.
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Change the Policy - 1 per 5

You decide to set the policy to reserve 1 spare drive for every 5 available drive. Change the policy to 1 per 5 using the
drop down menu.
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Change the Policy - 1 per 10

After doing this, you see that the number of disks to keep unused changes to 2 disks
disks. This is because you set the
policy to keep 1 out of every 5 drives as a hot spare. Since you have 10 SAS Flash drives total, the policy reserves 2
drives.
Even though Joe wants to have enough hot spares to be extra safe when the new drives arrive, keeping 1 out of every 5
drives for a hot spare is wasting a lot of drives. You decide to change the policy to 1 per 10 instead.
Use the drop down menu to change the policy to 1 per 10
10.
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Apply Changes
Notice that the number of disks to keep unused changes to 1 disks
disks. This number will increase depending on how
many drives Joe ordered to be added to the system. If even 1 new drive is added, the number to reserve for hot spares
will increase to 2, which meets Joe's requirement of having at least 2 spare Flash drives available at any time.
Click Apply
Apply.
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Now to make sure the Hot Spare Policy is working, you decide to try to create a storage pool using more drives than
allowed by the policy.
2. Click Storage Pools
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Create Storage Pool

Click Create to begin creating a storage pool.
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Manually Select Drives

You will try to make a pool that will violate the Hot Spare Policy to make sure it is working. You immediately notice that
only 4 disks are shown under the extreme performance tier. You decide to add the drives manually to the pool to see
how the system will handle this.
1. Click Manual
2. Click Select
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Add a Disk
Here you can see the available and selected disks, as well as a summary of the Hot Sparing Policies. To add another
Flash Drive to the pool:
1. Select the SAS Flash drive under Available Disks
2. Click the purple arrow
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Policy Violated
After adding the disk, you see that warning icons appear on the Hot Spare Policy summary above, indicating that the
SAS Flash policy will be violated.
Click OK
OK.
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Cancel Creation
A warning pops up to inform the user that adding the disk to the pool will violate the Hot Spare Policy. To cancel the
creation:
1. Click No
2. Click Cancel on the Disk Selection window
3. Click Cancel on the Create Storage Pool window
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Lab 3 - File Systems and Shares
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Creating a File System

After provisioning storage for the India team, you check your email to find another message from Joe.
Good morning,
I just got a call from the manager of the India Marketing team. While you're provisioning storage for the
social media project, could you also set up a small share for the managers to use for this project? The total
capacity should be about 8 GB.
Thanks,
Joe
After reading Joe's email, you decide the easiest way to do this is to create a standalone CIFS server and a
CIFS share. This will allow you to set a password for access instead of joining the CIFS server to the domain.
Before you can do this however, you will need to create a File System for the share to be associated with.
Note: Some additional setup is required before the steps in this lab can be performed. A Storage Pool for File
must contain storage capacity from LUNs that were created for file use and added to the filestorage storage
group. In the interest of time these steps have already been completed.
Note: While the VNX2 also supports NFS, we will only be covering CIFS in this lab.
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Navigate to the File Systems Page

2. Click File Systems
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Create a File System

This page will show all existing File Systems on the system. Click Create to create a new File System.
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Choose Parameters
1. Name the File System Marketing_FS
2. Set the storage capacity to 8 GB
3. Click OK to create the File System
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Verify Creation
Verify that the newly created File System is now shown in the list.
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Creating a CIFS Server and CIFS Share

Now that you have created a File System, you will create a CIFS Server and CIFS Share.
Navigate to the CIFS Page

2. Click CIFS
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Create a CIFS Server

On the page that appears:
1. Click the CIFS Servers tab
2. Click Create
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Marketing CIFS Server

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Server Type: Standalone

NetBIOS Name: Marketing
Workgroup: Marketing
Set Local Admin Password: Password123#
Confirm Admin Password: Password123#
Select the 192.168.1.40 interface
Click OK
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Confirm Creation
Click OK to confirm.
Verify Server Creation

Confirm the newly created CIFS Server now appears in the list.
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Create a CIFS Share

Now you will create a CIFS Share associated with the CIFS Server and File System you created previously.
1. Click the Shares tab
2. Click Create
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Choose Parameters
1. Set the CIFS Share name to Social_Media
2. Click OK.
Note: Leave the Marketing CIFS Server checkbox unchecked so the share can be accessed through additional CIFS
Servers in the future. The share will still be accessible through the Marketing CIFS Server.
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Verify Share Creation

Verify that the newly created CIFS Share now appears in the list.
Change Admin Password

Before the standalone CIFS server can be accessed, you are required to change the administrator password for the
server. To do this, navigate back to the desktop and click Actions > Send > Keys... > Ctrl + Alt +Del on the top bar of your
lab session.
Note: You may need to access the Actions menu by clicking the highlighted yellow tab from the top of your RDP
window.
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Change a password
Click Change a password...
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Enter Password Information

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Change the first field from vlab.local\Administrator to 192.168.1.40\Administrator

Old Password: Password123#
New Password: Password123!
Confirm Password: Password123!
Click the blue arrow
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Confirm Password was Changed

You will get a confirmation when the password has been changed. Click OK
OK.
Computer
On the desktop, double-click Computer
Computer.
Navigate to CIFS Share

1. In the address bar at the top, type \\192.168.1.40\Social_Media
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2. Click the green arrow
Verify Access
Verify that you can access the share. You can now close all non-Unisphere windows.
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Lab 4 - Multicore Cache and

Multicore FAST Cache
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Multicore Cache Features

Now that you have provisioned storage and given access to the India Marketing Team, you decide to take a
look at the two caching technologies available in VNX2, Multicore Cache and Multicore FAST Cache. The first
of these is Multicore Cache. The Multicore Cache feature provided in VNX2 uses the System Memory for
Cache. It introduces the following changes:
Completely multicore scalable

Dynamic cache that automatically allocates read/write cache
High/Low Watermarks have been removed
Cache page size is now locked at 8KB
Flushing has been changed from forced to predicted
Write cache can be enabled/disabled at the array or Classic LUN level
Proactively cleans pages during times of low activity, leaving clean pages in cache
You start by exploring this feature in Unisphere.
System
Click the System tab on the top bar.
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Manage Cache
Click Manage Cache on the right.
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View Properties
Note that the High/Low Watermarks, write cache size, and page size options have been removed. The system will
dynamically allocate cache for reads/writes as necessary and the cache now has a fixed page size of 8KB. You can
also see the Read/Write Cache Hit Ratios and Dirty Pages (MB) here.
Note that the read cache is always enabled, and write cache is enabled by default. Your numbers may be different
than those shown below.
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Configuring FAST Cache

Along with creating storage, you want to ensure that your customers are taking full advantage of each data
efficiency feature. Since you just created a new mixed pool and LUN and explored Multicore Cache, you also
want to provide better performance by utilizing FAST Cache. Multicore FAST Cache serves as a high-capacity
secondary cache to Multicore Cache you viewed in the SP Cache tab. Flash drives positioned between the
storage processors DRAM-based primary cache and hard disk drives form this cache and provide improved
access times and higher I/O rates. The Flash drives no longer need to be dedicated to specific applications.
FAST Cache provides a much larger, scalable cache by using Flash drives that provides very large capacities
as compared to DRAM.
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Create FAST Cache

After taking a look at the new features of Multicore Cache, you should be in the Storage System Properties window.
1. Click the FAST Cache tab
2. Click the Create button
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Select Disks
You will let the system automatically select the drives to use for the FAST Cache.
1. Ensure that RAID Type is set to 1, Number of Disks is set to 2, and Automatic is selected
2. Click OK to create FAST Cache
Continue
Click Yes to continue with FAST Cache creation.
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Close the Window

Note that FAST Cache creation may take some time. You may continue on to the rest of the labs while this happens.
Click OK in the Storage Systems Properties to close the window.
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Lab 5 - FAST VP
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Creating LUNs with Different Tiering Policies

Now that deduplication has been enabled, you move on to the last part of the email. It looks like the
marketing team will need storage for their media, statistics, and weekly reports. You decide that the best
feature to use here is Fully Automated Storage Tiering for Virtual Provisioning (FAST VP). FAST VP can both
lower Total Cost of Ownership and simultaneously increase performance by intelligently managing data
placement at a sub-LUN level. When FAST VP is implemented, the storage system measures, analyzes, and
implements a dynamic storage tiering policy much faster and more efficiently than a human analyst could
ever achieve. To make things easier, you choose to use the Marketing - Social Media pool that you already
created.

From the top menu:
2. Select Storage Pools
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View Properties
In the Pools section:
1. Locate and select the Marketing - Social Media pool
2. Click the Properties button in the bottom menu
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View Tiers
In the Properties window:
1. Navigate to the Tiering tab. Notice that you have the ability to use three different tiers in a single pool
(Extreme Performance, Performance, and Capacity). You can also see that each tier has its own RAID
Configuration.
2. Click OK to exit the properties window
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Create LUN
1. Right-click the Marketing - Social Media pool
2. Select Create LUN
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Choose Parameters
In the Create LUN window:
1. Select the size of the LUN to be 10GB
2. Name the LUN Marketing - Social Media Pictures and Videos
Lowest Available Tier

Since the pictures and videos will be used for the social media website, the marketing team will not access this data
that often. You decide it's best to put them in the lowest available tier. This tier is selected for LUNs that are not
performance-sensitive or response-time sensitive.
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1. Once the LUN has been named, select the Advanced tab at the top of the window
2. In the FAST Settings section, change the Tiering Policy to Lowest Available Tier
3. Click Apply
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Confirm LUN Creation

You will immediately be prompted to confirm that you want to create the LUN.
Marketing LUN Created

You will be notified once the LUN has been successfully created.
Click OK.
Create a Second LUN

You will now use this window to create another LUN. While remaining in the Create LUN window:
1. Return to the General tab
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3. Name the LUN Marketing - Social Media Statistics
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Highest Available Tier

The marketing team will continuously collect and edit statistics each day. These files will contain thousands of data
points including graphs, tables, and other figures. You decide this would be appropriate in the highest available tier.
This tier is selected for those LUNs which that require high levels of performance whenever they are accessed.
1. Select the Advanced tab at the top of the window
2. In the FAST Settings section, change the Tiering Policy to Highest Available Tier
3. Click Apply to create this LUN
Confirm Second LUN Creation

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LUN created successfully

Click OK once you acknowledge this.
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Create a Third LUN

You will now use this window to create another LUN. While remaining in the Create LUN window:
1. Return to the General tab
3. Name the LUN Marketing - Social Media Weekly Reports
Start High then Auto-Tier

Each week, the marketing team will be creating a report to update management on the status of the social media
project. These reports will be heavily accessed toward the last couple days of each week and at the end of the month,
but once management reads it, they won't be used as often. You decide that this storage should start in highest
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available tier, then auto-tier. This tiering policy will initially place data in the highest available tier and then data
movement is subsequently based on the activity level of the data. Since the reports will be heavily accessed at the
end of the week/month, they will be placed in the higher tiers. During the following months, these reports will not be
accessed that often and will therefore be automatically moved to a lower tier if more active data requires space on the
higher tiers.
1. Select the Advanced tab at the top of the window
2. In the FAST Settings section, leave the Tiering Policy at Start High then Auto-Tier
3. Click Apply to create this LUN.
Confirm Third LUN creation

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Success
Click OK
OK.
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Cancel Create LUN

Now that all three LUNs have been created, click Cancel to exit the Create LUN window.
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Verify LUN Creation

In the pool details area below, verify that the three LUNs you just created are present.
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Navigate to the Storage Groups Page

Now you will assign these LUNs to a storage group so they can be accessed by the India team.
1. Hover over Hosts
2. Click Storage Groups
Connect LUNs
1. Select the India storage group
2. Click Connect LUNs
Select LUNs
1. Expand SP A and SP B
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2. Ctrl+Click each of the 3 LUNs you just created to select them all
3. Click Add
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Verify Selected LUNs

1. Verify that the 3 new LUNs are now shown under Selected LUNs
2. Click OK
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Confirm
Click Yes to add the LUNs to the storage group.
LUN successfully added

Verify that the task was successful and click OK
OK.
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Verify LUNs were Added

1. Click the LUNs tab in the Details area
2. Verify that the 3 new LUNs are now part of the India storage group
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Lab 6 - Snapshots
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Local Rapid Restore

At this point, you have provisioned all of the storage that the marketing team will need for the social media
project. You notice you have received another email from Joe. The email reads:
Good afternoon,
I just received an email from the India marketing team saying that someone accidentally deleted all of the
annual report data from 2012. I was asked if there is any way they can get this data restored. The team is in
need of it for research they are doing. If you could just go ahead and recover the data, that would be great.
Thanks,
Joe
After reading this, you remember seeing an Annual Reports LUN in Unisphere, as well as an option to create
a snapshot. If you are lucky, the previous storage administrator may have taken snapshots on this LUN,
allowing you to quickly recover the accidentally deleted data. VNX Snapshots is a software feature that
enables you to create and manage point-in-time copies of a LUN. It uses redirect on write (ROW) technology.
New writes to the source LUN are written to a location in the storage pool that is different from the location to
which the original data is written, and only the index for the data changes.
You start by viewing the reports on the host to verify that the 2012 report data is missing.
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Computer
On your host, minimize Unisphere and double-click Computer on the Windows Desktop.
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View Annual Reports

Verify that the hard disk named Marketing - Annual Reports is present and double-click it.
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Verify 2012 is Missing

Here you can see that the 2012 Annual Reports folder is indeed missing.
Navigate to the LUN Snapshots Page

Return to Unisphere
Unisphere. In the top menu, hover over Data Protection and select LUN Snapshots.
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View Snapshots
In the Snapshots tab, expand the Marketing - Annual Reports LUN.
You're in luck! It looks like there is a recent snapshot of the Marketing - Annual Reports LUN that will allow you to
restore the deleted data. You see that the snapshot is from 2014-03-14.You make a quick call to the India team to
ensure that no important changes were made since this snapshot was created, since restoring will remove all changes
to the LUN since this point in time. After talking to a member of the India team, you are given the go ahead to restore
the LUN.
However, before you restore the LUN from the snapshot, you should offline the disk in Windows.
Leave this window open and go back to the Windows desktop.
Server Manager
Back at the desktop, open Server Manager at the bottom.
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Initialize Disk
If you see an Initialize Disk box appear, click OK
OK.
Disk Management
In the Server Manager window expand Storage and select Disk Management
Management.
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Offline the Disk

In the Disk Management window:
1. Locate and right-click the left side of the Marketing - Annual Reports disk
2. Click Offline
Note that the disk number may be different than below.
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Restore to Snapshot
Now you can navigate back to Unisphere and restore to the snapshot.
1. Select the snapshot
2. Click Restore
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Confirm Restore
Click Yes to initiate the restore operation.
Create Backup Snapshot

You will be prompted to create a backup snapshot. The system automatically creates a backup snapshot in case you
change your mind later and want to undo the restore operation and return the LUN to its current state. Click OK to
create the backup snapshot.
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Success
The restore operation has been started successfully. Click OK
OK.
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Online the Disk

Now go back to Server Manager.
1. Right click the disk you just offlined on the left hand side
2. Click Online
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Open Annual Reports Drive

Double-click the Marketing - Annual Reports drive.
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Confirm 2012 Data Restored

Confirm that the 2012 Annual Reports folder has been restored.
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Creating Snapshots
Phew! Good thing there was a snapshot of that LUN containing the annual reports. That could have been a
lot more work if they permanently deleted those files. You noticed that the Marketing Annual - Reports LUN
was the only LUN with existing snapshots. To be safe in the future you decide that you should create
snapshots of the other LUNs. Since we created several of the LUNs earlier today and they have no data yet,
we will focus on the previously existing Marketing - Monthly Reports LUN for now.
Navigate to the LUNs Page

Back in Unisphere:
2. Click LUNs
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Create Snap
1. Select the Marketing - Monthly Reports LUN
2. Click Create Snap at the bottom
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Name Snapshot
By default, a time stamp is used for the snapshot name.
Keep this default and click OK
OK.
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Success
The snapshot has been created successfully. Now if another accidental deletion happens you will be able to restore
the monthly report data to this point-in-time. You make a mental note to take snapshots of the other LUNs once they
start getting more filled with data. Click OK
OK.
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LUN Properties
To verify the snapshot has been created:
1. Highlight the Marketing - Monthly Reports LUN
2. Click Properties
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View Snapshot
1. Click the Snapshots tab
2. Here you can see the snapshot you just created
3. Click OK to close the Properties window
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Conclusion
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Final Words
Email Reply
Joe is going to be impressed. You were able to easily get everything that Joe and the India team needed done with no
problems. To end the day, you provide Joe with an update with everything that you have completed. Your email to him
reads:
Good afternoon Joe,

Today, I was able to take care of all of the data resources for the marketing team in India. I think they will be very
happy with the results.
To help with the new social media project, I created a new storage pool that all of the Marketing team's data can reside
on. In this pool, I provided a Thin LUN for all of the daily reports that will be generated. I used a Thin LUN since I wasn't
sure how much storage they would actually need. I also created a standalone CIFS server and CIFS share for the
managers to access.
In an attempt to save space in this LUN, I enabled Block Deduplication. Since much of the daily reports data will be the
same and most of the data will not be accessed frequently after a while, this LUN was a good candidate for
deduplication.
I also created a few more LUNs for all of the media, statistics, and weekly reports that the team will use. To help lower
the total cost of ownership, I took advantage of EMC's FAST VP feature since it increases performance by automatically
managing data placement based on activity level. I have set this relocation to take place everyday during off-peak
hours. This relocation won't affect the team. I also implemented FAST Cache on all of this storage because it can
improve the access times and provide higher I/O. I think they will be happy with this increased performance.
I also took care of your request to keep additional Flash drives free at all times once the new shipment comes in. I
used VNX's new Hot Spare Policies to automatically ensure that at least 2 flash drives will always be kept as spares
once the new drives are installed.
Lastly, I was able to recover the 2012 Annual Report data that was deleted today and this data is once again
accessible by the India Marketing Team. Luckily there was an existing snapshot that I was able to restore to. I will
continue to periodically take snapshots of the team's LUNs in order to avoid accidental data loss in the future.
I look forward to using these features for future projects.
Thanks!
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Congratulations!
Not only did you provide efficient data resources for the new Marketing Social Media project taking place in India, but
you were also able to utilize data protection services and use VNX Snapshots to recover accidentally deleted files. You
also took advantage of the different tiering policies for each LUN and used Block Deduplication to save some space for
future research. This was only one example showing how you can use these features to improve your daily
provisioning activities.
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VNX2 STORAGE MANAGEMENT

Lab Overview .............................................................................................................................................. 15

Lab 1 - Login to Unisphere .......................................................................................................................... 19

Lab 2 - Virtual Provisioning ......................................................................................................................... 34

Lab 3 - File Systems and Shares.................................................................................................................. 66

Lab 4 - Multicore Cache and Multicore FAST Cache...................................................................................... 83

Lab 5 - FAST VP ........................................................................................................................................... 91

Lab 6 - Snapshots..................................................................................................................................... 112

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 132