Hello,

right now we are evaluating ScaleIO, we are planning to use it for a new HyperV deployment that will scale in the future.

I'd like to understand exactly how licensing works.

We are planning to start with a cluster of three nodes (all-flash) with 1,92 TB SSD and with a ScaleIO "starter" license (RAW capacity: 12 TB).

Since a higher number of disks help to achieve better performance we would like to install more than 2 SSD disks per node and limit the capacity to have 12 TB of RAW storage. I saw a function in "Backend" that let us limit the hard disk capacity at physical disk level called: "Set Device Capacity Limit". When applied the "Capacity" applet in the dashboard shows the space limitation as "Decreased" but the total is however the sum of the raw space of disks installed in every system. Obviously the "Decreased" space is unavailable to create volumes.

So if we install 6 SSD every node we have a total RAW physical space of: 1,92 TB * 18 = 34,56 TB but if we limit the space of every single disk using the function "Set Device Capacity Limit" from ScaleIO to 666 GB for every device we have 666 GB * 18 = 11988 GB. In this case we are in the term of use of the 12 TB license?

In the image you can see an example: a ScaleIO deployment of 3 nodes. Every node has a disk of 127 GB so we have a total of 381 GB. I set a limit of 100 GB on disks installed in every node, so 81 GB are marked as "Decreased" and aren't available for volume creation. In this specific case we have to license ScaleIO for 381 GB or it is sufficient to license it for 300 GB? (I know that the minimum license is 12 TB but the example is useful to understand how licensing works).

Thanks in Advance,

Davide