PowerFlex: How to Validate and Claim the Data Reduction Ratio (DRR) Guarantee Program

As part of the Dell Future-Proof Program, customers can make claims against DELL TECHNOLOGIES POWERFLEX DATA REDUCTION GUARANTEE TERMS AND CONDITIONS.

These claims for PowerFlex are made by a customer reaching out to his Dell sales account team.

The very first part of the DRR Guarantee claim is to ensure the system is covered by it:

• PowerFlex systems sold prior to March 5, 2025 must have a signed agreement, and this must have been signed prior to the sale of that PowerFlex system.
• The current no-signature agreement PowerFlex DELL TECHNOLOGIES POWERFLEX DATA REDUCTION GUARANTEE TERMS AND CONDITIONS covers PowerFlex systems sold on or after March 5, 2025. Prior purchases are not covered by this no-signature agreement. There are no special cases regarding this.
• What are the service tags (DST) for the PowerFlex nodes in this system? These are needed to check the sales dates first regarding this. Legacy signed agreements for systems purchased prior to March 5, 2025 are held in a secure repository at Dell. If a legacy agreement was signed, it will be linked to the sales order number(s) covering the PowerFlex system

Validation

The first check customers may perform is validating the compression ratio (DRR). This can be validated with PowerFlex Manager screenshots or CLI commands (scli). Example using CLI (scli):

Login to the Primary MDM with admin login 

1. Find the storage pools configured

scli --login --username admin --password <admin_password> --management_system_ip <PFMP_UI_IP>

scli --query_all

2. For each storage pool configured with fine granularity, find the compression ratio (DRR)

scli --query_storage_pool --storage_pool_name <name> --protection_domain_name <name>

Focus on this section of the output:

  User data:
        125.9 TB (128968 GB) total user data
                0 Bytes medium granularity user data
                125.9 TB (128968 GB) fine granularity user data
                        73.9 TB (75641 GB) compressed data (3.4:1 compression ratio)
                        52.1 TB (53327 GB) uncompressed data
        66.6 TB (68172 GB) trimmed capacity
        59.4 TB (60796 GB) user data without trimmed capacity
        1.1:1 total compression ratio # This is the compression ratio for the pool

If this is below the rate in the agreement covering this PowerFlex array, move onto the next step.

The next check is on the pool used metric. This needs to be 70% or more and can be validated with PowerFlex Manager screenshots or CLI commands executed by the customer.

Example using the command (scli):

1. Find the storage pools configured

scli –query_all

2. Examine the storage pools for used %

scli –query_storage_pool –storage_pool_name <name> --protection_domain_name <name>

Focus on this section of the output:

 Physical data:
        447.1 TB (457845 GB) total capacity
                121.9 TB (124812 GB) in-use capacity
                        108.5 TB (111078 GB) user data
                        9.8 TB (10069 GB) metadata
                        3.6 TB (3664 GB) fine granularity spares
                213.4 TB (218571 GB) unused capacity
                111.8 TB (114461 GB) spare capacity

Calculate Used% as follows:

Used% = ( in-use_capacity + spare_capacity ) / total_capacity * 100

For the above example:

Used% = ( 121.9 + 111.8 ) / 447.1 * 100 = 52.3%

If used% is 70% or above, this PowerFlex system may qualify for a claim. For this example, it was not above 70%, so a claim is not valid. However, if this ratio is 70% or greater, the next step is to engage your Dell sales account team sharing these findings, and they will carry this forward with an internal Dell Storage Data Reduction (SDR) Team to determine

1) Is it a valid claim

2) Possibly collect more data

3) Calculate if a remediation is justified

 If so, customer to contact his Dell sales account team who are aware of the details of that remediation, and to execute a remediation order.

The Dell SDR Team will look up whether or not there is a signed DDR Guarantee agreement on file or will request one during this process; or, validate if the PowerFlex system is covered by the most recent no-signature agreement. The SDR Team will communicate all findings, data collection requests, and conclusions through your Dell sales account team.