You don't need Raid in the virtual partition, because what are you going to do, replace a virtual disk? This might be your problem. Only physical disks will have protection, and then the virtual disks aren't protected. Now, if you have dual VIOS servers, each providing one 1/2 of the "set" of the mirror, then that is giving you additional protection from losing a VIOS server. Then also, each VIOS server would have it's own disks as well, and they would most likely be raided.
Pete
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Pete Massiello
iTech Solutions
http://www.itechsol.com
http://www.iInTheCloud.com
-----Original Message-----
From: midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:midrange-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Pete Helgren
Sent: Monday, February 11, 2013 4:54 PM
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion
Subject: Virtual disks for an i partition
I have heard this a few times now so I want to make sure I understand this because I may reconfigure my JS12 blade in the near future.
Dr Franken, and I think Rob Berendt (many moons ago), both mentioned virtual arms being key. I had originally configured the Blade and SAS modules incorrectly, operating on some limited knowledge of the whole environment by creating a physical mirrored pair for VIOS and a physical mirrored pair for IBM i. I recently installed another Blade Center and had a few light bulbs come on about virtual disks vs the SAS Storage Module. I think the general approach should be that you raid together the physical disks into a large array and then build a single large volume and create smaller virtual disks from the larger volume as needed.
So a few questions:
I seem to recall that the recommendation for VIOS installation use two mirrored physical disks but now I am not so sure that is necessary if the 6 320 GB drives in the SAS cage were one volume and then two smaller virtual disk were carved out for VIOS. Is my assumption about physical disks for VIOS incorrect?
If I understand Rob and the good Doctor correctly, I should carve out at least 6 virtual disks for IBM i? Then in IBM i I also create a RAID array from those 6 disks (or is that redundant?)
I guess I never fully virtualized my thinking: The configuration of IBM i on VIOS should mimic a physical configuration. Yes?
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Pete Helgren
www.petesworkshop.com
GIAC Secure Software Programmer-Java
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