How to migrate volumes to new disk enclosures using Veritas InfoScale and Storage Foundation

Problem

This article discusses how to migrate volumes to new disk enclosures using Veritas InfoScale and Storage Foundation.

Solution

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Present, and scan, the disks (LUNs) from the storage array
3. Scan the new disks
4. Initialize the new disks
5. Add the disks from the target storage array into the same diskgroup as the disks from the source array
6. Move the volumes to the target disks

1. Introduction

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This article contains a procedure for migrating data to a new set of disks.

2. Present the disks (LUNs) from the SAN

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Present the disks, or LUNs, from both the source and target disk arrays. The process of presenting disks, takes place on the SAN, outside of Veritas. This is typically accomplished from the disk enclosure, in combination with SAN zoning or LUN masking. The procedure for presenting LUNs varies, depending on the hardware vendor.

How to add and remove physical LUNs connected to a server
https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/article.100039198


The new enhanced dmpdr tool will only work in connection with Veritas DMP (Dynamic Multi-Pathing) for Solaris and Linux platforms. Third-party multi-pathing drivers ( such as MPxIO and EMC PowerPath ) are not supported and will not work with the new interface.

To reduce the complexity surrounding the multi-step Dynamic LUN reconfiguration process, Veritas has created a new non-interactive interface to aid the provisioning and removal of devices.

# /usr/lib/vxvm/voladm.d/bin/dmpdr -o refresh

3. Scan the new disks

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Once the new disks have been presented, they can be scanned. Different platforms have slight variations in the methods for scanning for disks. Table 1 contains direct links to the "Discovering and configuring newly added disk devices" section of the HTML version of the Storage Foundation 6.0.1 Administrator's Guide.


Table 1 - Direct links to the "Discovering and configuring newly added disk devices" section of the Storage Foundation 6.0.1 Administrator's Guide

If the disks have been scanned properly, they should be visible to both Veritas, AND the operating system. If the new disks are not visible to vxdisk after performing a scan, verify that the disks are visible to the operating system.
 

"Verifying that a disk is readable by the operating system"
https://www.veritas.com/docs/000087435

4. Initialize the new disks

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Use vxdisksetup to initialize the new disks. This initialization process creates the Veritas private region on the disks and allows them to be added into a disk group.


Figure 1 - Using vxdisksetup to initialize a disk

5. Add the disks from the target storage array into the same diskgroup as the disks from the source array

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Figure 2 - Using vxdg to add new disks to an existing disk group

6. Move the volumes to the target disks

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Several different procedures and steps for moving volumes and subdisks are discussed in the following article.

"Moving volumes and subdisks with Veritas Storage Foundation"
https://www.veritas.com/docs/000018273