SRDF/Metro online device expansion

With the new PowerMaxOS 5978.444.444 release, you can now expand SRDF/Metro devices, and thus the VMware datastores built on top of them, online. You may recall in our current release you can expand SRDF/Metro devices but it does require suspending access to the R2 by changing the RDF mode to synchronous. I wrote this up...

VMworld Europe update – NVMeoF

I'm attending VMworld in Barcelona Spain this week delivering a session on NVM and NVMe, the same one I delivered in Las Vegas in fact...well almost. Our development team has made some great progress on the next generation of connectivity, NVMeoF or NVMe over fabric, so I am including a demonstration on that. To that...

TechBook update for PowerMax

Well PowerMax has been out for a few months now but I only just finished my VMAX/PowerMax/VMware TechBook update here. It's always a bear to be perfectly honest since it encompasses all best practices but the blog can only buy me so much time before we need it in official form. I've managed to get...

VSI 7.3

Happy New Year everyone. It's been a bit since I've posted but we do have a new VSI release to talk about. This one comes late as we do normally release quarterly, but seeing as it wasn't expected at all, I suppose a month late isn't bad. So last time I wrote about VSI, I mentioned 7.2 was most...

VMAX TB and best practices

I've just completed the latest update to the VMAX/VMware TechBook, a tome (I can be derogatory since it's mine) of some 400 plus pages that explains how best to use VMware on the various VMAX/VMAX3/VMAX AFA arrays. You can find it here. When customers ask me about best practices, a link to this doc is...

VMware-VMAX integration

This week at Dell EMC World I presented a session on the ways the VMAX platform integrates into VMware software. Essentially this is my job, figuring out where we can integrate and then whether we should integrate - and of course all that follows - researching, testing, documenting, etc. We already have lots of integration points...

VMAX/VMware TechBook, VAAI WP

The after-EMC World documentation updates continue with the publishing of the VMAX VMware TechBook (Using EMC VMAX Storage in VMware vSphere Environments): Click to enlarge – use browser back button to return to post and the VAAI whitepaper (Using VMware vSphere Storage APIs for Array Integration with EMC Symmetrix): Click to enlarge – use browser...

TB Update: Using EMC VMAX Storage in VMware vSphere Environments

The title of the blog may be familiar to those who have ever used the TechBook (TB) on VMAX storage and VMware.  Today we published the latest update to the TechBook: Click to enlarge in new window The title of the TechBook has actually changed slightly - instead of "Symmetrix Storage" it is now "VMAX...

VMAX Content Pack in the Age of vRealize

If you're wondering about the title, VMware decided some time ago to rename a suite of their products to "vRealize" from "vCenter".  As I am not in marketing nor work for VMware I can't expound on the reasoning for the rename but I can tell you what it means to me is I have to...

VMAX3 Q4 GA – RDF/SNAPVX/XCOPY

The Q4 release of VMAX3/HYPERMAX OS is here.  As Less Grossman would say "Welcome to the goody room!"  This release has the features we have been waiting for since the VMAX3 went GA (yes I know barely 2 months ago) - Local/Remote replication and the return of the VAAI primitive Full Copy (or XCOPY) among...