Dell 36XX, 34XX, 38XX, 32XX manual Primary And Secondary Virtual Disks, Setting Up Remote Replication

–The first port that successfully establishes an iSCSI connection is used for all subsequent communication with that remote storage array. If that connection subsequently fails, a new session is attempted using any available ports.

Primary And Secondary Virtual Disks

Before you create any replication relationships, virtual disks must exist at both the primary site and the secondary site. The virtual disk that resides on the local storage array is the primary virtual disk. Similarly, the virtual disk that resides on the remote storage array is the secondary virtual disk. If neither the primary virtual disk nor the secondary virtual disk exist, you must create these virtual disks. Keep these guidelines in mind when you create the secondary virtual disk:

•The secondary virtual disk must be of equal or greater size than the primary virtual disk.

•The RAID level of the secondary virtual disk does not have to be the same as the primary virtual disk.

Setting Up Remote Replication

Setting up Remote Replication between local and remote storage arrays consists of the following:

•Enabling Remote Replication (on both storage arrays)

•Activating the Remote Replication premium feature on both the local and remote storage arrays.

•Creating a Remote Replication group on the local storage array.

•Adding a replicated pair of virtual disks to the Remote Replication group.

Enabling The Remote Replication Premium Feature

The first step in creating a remote replication is to make sure that the Remote Replication premium feature is enabled on both storage arrays. Because Remote Replication is a premium feature, you need a feature key file to enable the premium feature. The command for enabling the feature key file is as follows:

enable storageArray feature file=”asyncReplicationactivation_key”

In this command, asyncReplication is literal and is appended with the activation_key, which is provided by Dell. For example, if your activation key value is 999999:

enable storageArray feature file="asyncReplication999999"

Activating The Remote Replication Premium Feature

Activating the Remote Replication premium feature prepares the storage arrays to create and configure replication relationships. After you activate the premium feature, the secondary ports for each RAID controller module are reserved and dedicated to remote replication use. In addition, replication repository virtual disks are automatically created for each RAID controller module in the storage array.

To activate the Remote Replication premium feature, use this command:

activate storageArray feature=asyncReplication

Creating A Remote Replication Group

The first step in establishing a Remote Replication relationship is to create a replication group on the local storage array. A replication group cannot be created on the remote storage array.

91