Configuring Hot Spare Replacements

Use the Hot Spare feature to designate volumes to act as hot spares— dedicated volumes that are reserved for replacing volumes that fail in a mirror.

If hot spares are available and designated for the virtual volume, in the event of a volume failure that remains failed for 60 minutes, the failed volume is replaced with a Hot Spare volume. A volume is selected that closest fits in size. If the replacement fails, it is retried every 60 minutes. After a successful replacement, the hot spare automatically synchronizes with the surviving mirror. (Refer to our Technical Support Web site for instructions on changing the replacement time.)

This feature is not supported for linear virtual volumes, Traveller reference volumes, proxied volumes, or volumes configured as dual path. The primary and secondary volumes of a tertiary mirror can be used as a hot spare, although the tertiary volume in the mirror can not be used as a hot spare.

WARNING:  The replacement will fail if SANmanager is open on any storage server or Management Console in the region. If you are using this feature, SANmanager should be exited when configuration actions are not in progress.

Configuring hot spare replacements consists of:

  • Creating dedicated Hot Spare Pools. Creating a dedicated pool on each storage server is not a requirement, but a best practice in order to provide another layer of protection by providing volumes from a different pool than the failed volume. The pool must be created on each storage server that will be providing volumes to virtual volumes that require replacement upon failure and be of the same type (dynamic, static). Create volumes from each pool.

  • Designate the volumes as hot spares (instructions below).

  • Enable the Replace Volume on Failure feature for virtual volumes (instructions below).

To designate volumes as hot spares:

  1. In the SANmanager Virtual Volumes tab, select the appropriate storage server in the upper-left pane.

  2. In the upper-right pane, select a volume to designate as a hot spare.

  1. Choose Properties from the context menu.

  2. In the Volume Properties dialog box, select the Hot Spare check box, and click OK. (Clear the check box to disable the feature.)

  3. Repeat for all volumes to be designated as hot spares.

  4. Apply the configuration.

To enable the Replace Volume on Failure feature for virtual volumes:

  1. In the SANmanager Virtual Volumes tab, in the lower-left pane, select a virtual volume that requires a volume replacement upon failure, and choose Properties from the context menu.

  2. In the Virtual Volume Properties dialog box, select the Replace Volume on Failure check box, and click OK. (Clear the check box to disable the feature.)

  3. Repeat for all virtual volumes that need automatic replacement for failed volumes.

  4. Apply the configuration.

Configuring Hot Spare Replacements